


now i'm bleeding

by kitthae



Series: catching death [1]
Category: ONEUS (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Vampire, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Angst and Fluff and Smut, Blood, Blood Drinking, Fluff, Human/Vampire Relationship, Kinda Main Character Death, M/M, Sick Character, Smut, Terminal Illnesses, Vampire Turning, Vampires, Vomiting, is this sick fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-02
Updated: 2021-01-02
Packaged: 2021-03-12 05:07:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 23,143
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28504962
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kitthae/pseuds/kitthae
Summary: Maybe he would like it, even. Fall into doom at the hands of a human, give in to the temptation, the thought that always lingers at the back of his head. What if one day, someone fights back, and wins? What if one day, a pretty boy pushes him down, sits on his chest and takes him apart. Sinks his teeth into him and sticks.
Relationships: Lee Seoho/Son Dongju | Xion
Series: catching death [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2088018
Comments: 9
Kudos: 47





	now i'm bleeding

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to 2021!
> 
> This is the first part of a series of WeUs vampire adventures that I have been writing. I finished this part back in October, actually, and I have the second part done too and the third in the works, but I only decided to post this now because I normally like to have more done before I post because otherwise I'm unsure if I'll get to finishing it. Nevertheless, here we are now :^D
> 
> I will warn you that this fic, as most vampire fics do, contains themes of blood/blood loss/biting. I didn't tag Major Character Death because it technically doesn't occur, these are vampires so no one actually dies. There are themes of a terminal illness (not a chronic but an acute one), though, so be careful if you are sensitive to reading things like vomit, seizures, fevers, and generally ill & dying characters.
> 
> Otherwise I'd just like to mention that some of the vampire biology in this probably doesn't make sense, and also that some of the characters may be a little OOC on occasion, remember that these are merely characters that I base off of WeUs's stage personas. Also don't go home with random strange vampires to let them drink your blood.
> 
> Enjoy! :)

“Oh my god.” The hands against Seoho’s shoulders still. “What the hell, are you a vampire?”

Record scratch. Hold on. How did he end up here?

It’s a tiny, dingy pub on a rundown street in the middle of the city. Not a place where the children of rich families would ever go, not even the adventurous ones. This is the dangerous part of town, where people go missing and are found days later in the alleys behind the pubs, drained of blood. The people that come here have no other way.

They like the adrenaline, too, maybe. Seoho knows of a few places down this street where humans willingly sell their bodies and blood for the rush of the venom in their veins. Not that he’s ever gone there.

Geonhak may consider him evil, but he’s not the kind of vampire to drain someone dry, he doesn’t leave poor kids to die in back alleys, and he’s not exactly a fan of the thought of some college students pimping themselves out to him to be able to afford their rent. He would rather give them the money directly, then.

He only ever comes to these parts of town when he’s desperate, when there’s no other way.

It’s been over two weeks since he last fed, and the hospitals are overrun these days. Too many new vampires, baby vampires still too thirsty for blood, they use up the supplies that have kept him and the others alive for so long.

Hunger begins to crawl through him like a slow spreading pain, builds a home in him. It’s a vicious friend, it keeps him alive, but it also nests in him, tears at his insides, never satiated. He has learned to pace himself over the years, he can go for longer without feeding than a baby vampire could, but he’s not immune to hunger’s claws.

Geonhak rolled his eyes when Seoho told him where he was going, but he chose to accompany him. Maybe only to make sure he doesn’t kill anyone — as if he would — but Seoho is glad for the company, still.

“This place again?” Geonhak wrinkles his nose. He hates these parts of town, anyway, Seoho knows. He would rather eat his own arm than pick up someone from here, such a good soul, but Seoho has no time for such kindness.

He shrugs. “Sure. It’s better than some other establishments you’ll find around here.” He shoulders the creaking door open, takes note of the lack of a bouncer. Anyone can come here. “Unless of course you’d like to go directly to one of those illegal blood banks. How scandalous, Geonhakie, not even _I_ would go that far.”

Geonhak mumbles something under his breath when Seoho throws him a wink.

They push through the crowd by the door, Seoho can tell most of them are vampires, anyway. The only beating heart he detects is that of a young man, attached to a vampire lady’s arm. He tears his eyes away. Not his business.

The music pumps in his ears, reverberates in his empty veins. Alcohol has little effect on vampires, but he orders drinks for them by the shady bar, anyway. Geonhak sits down next to him, cradles his chin in his hand.

“And what are you gonna do, now? Sit around and look pretty?”

“It’s what I do best,” Seoho replies easily. His eyes scan their surroundings, take in the masses of young people enjoying their weekend, the vampires threading in between the crowd, spreading their long fingers. He wouldn’t trust a single one of them himself. Sometimes he wonders if humans can’t see those hungry eyes, those evil smiles. If they are too blind to see the danger that awaits them in those arms, the imminent death of those hands.

Humans are sweet and kind. They taste like innocence and a hint of primal fear, a hint of something wild and untameable, unpredictable. But their eyes are naive and their legs can only carry so much of their weight.

“Come on, we really don’t have to spend this much time here. Pick someone up and let’s go.”

Seoho clicks his tongue. “So impatient. What happened to not taking advantage of humans?”

“That’s what you’re gonna do, anyway, so I don’t think I even have to pretend to try to stop you.”

“Excuse you.” A smile sneaks onto Seoho’s face, and he angles his face away so Geonhak can’t see. “Who’s saying that I’m only looking for food. Maybe I’m looking for company.”

He catches Geonhak rolling his eyes in his peripheral vision. “Because the last time you went out looking for _company_ went so well, right.”

Seoho lips draw into a pout. Geonhak doesn’t always have to hit where it hurts. “I think it did,” he says, though.

“Yeah, until he tried to literally take you apart and sell your heart on the black market.”

“He was _so_ cute, though.”

“You’re impossible.”

“I know, I think that’s part of my charm.” Seoho leans back in his chair a little. “But also, that was more than a decade ago, my friend. I think I’m more than ready to start looking for company again.”

“If you think so,” Geonhak mumbles, finishing the rest of his drink and pulling a face.

It’s just what Seoho does, and not even half an hour later he’s left Geonhak behind at the bar. If he wants to be a grumpy killjoy and spend the rest of his life holed up in his stinking castle with the same person, then that’s none of Seoho’s business, but he’s also not going to let him ruin his night. He didn’t invite him.

And the boy he has backed against the bar in front of him is much more interesting than any old vampire could ever be, anyway. He’s pretty, certainly, with the glitter smudged around his eyes and the stain of lipstick next to his mouth where he must have been kissing someone else, but Seoho mostly picked him out for his quick tongue. He’s never been a fan of humans who are too pliant, who just let him. He likes a bit of a challenge, a little flirting.

This boy is everything — his smile is a challenge, like he dares Seoho to come closer, like he won’t take the first step. A spark in his eyes, a flame that wants to be touched but burns everyone who dares.

Seoho likes these types of humans the most. The ones that know exactly what they’re in for, who play with it.

This is the type of boy he might have sought out even when he was still a human himself. Someone to be had in dark niches, someone to be chased, and broken down, and held. Already, he’s more than dinner.

“So you don’t come around here often?” the boy asks — he hasn’t even introduced himself. Surely his name would be something to be treasured, a precious piece of gold to be held closely to Seoho’s chest. Names are goods with immeasurable worth, and especially those of beautiful people.

“I don’t, actually. Only every once in a while, when I feel like it.”

The boy cocks his head to the side, his eyes rake down Seoho’s body. He looks so curious, mouth already parted in another question, but then his gaze flickers back up, white poison seeping into Seoho’s bones. His lips pull into a smile. “Well, I’ve never seen you around before, and I’m sure I would have noticed you. You sure you’ve been here before?” He sounds almost mocking, pulling at the string he has wrapped around his finger.

Seoho raises a brow. “It’s been a while since the last time, but I am sure, actually.”

“Mhm,” the boy hums under his breath. “Would you like another drink?”

Seoho weighs his empty glass in his hand. He would like a drink of something else, but there is no way he can say that now. Not when they draw closer and closer, until he can taste the boy’s sweet heartbeat in the air. His mouth waters, and he quenches his thirst with the new glass of cheap alcohol the boy hands him.

“You don’t seem drunk,” he says, although his eyes, too, seem way too alert.

“Neither do you,” Seoho returns, raising his glass to his lips. “My alcohol tolerance is way too high, I’m afraid.”

The boy’s eyes spark again, like he’s caught another fire under his lip. He eats Seoho alive with every word, and Seoho becomes less sure that he himself will not be the one being bitten by the end of the night. Maybe this boy, although so sweetly and perfectly human, with the sweetest blood pumping through him in a steady rhythm, will sink his pristine teeth into Seoho’s vulnerable flesh, will tear him apart at the seams. He wouldn’t be opposed.

Maybe he would like it, even. Fall into doom at the hands of a human, give in to the temptation, the thought that always lingers at the back of his head. What if one day, someone fights back, and wins? What if one day, a pretty boy pushes him down, sits on his chest and takes him apart. Sinks his teeth into him and sticks.

“Seoho.” From the side of the bar, Geonhak steps back into his field of vision. Seoho rolls his eyes. “Are you almost done? I do have better things planned for tonight.”

“Nobody said you had to come with me. I didn’t invite you,” Seoho says without ever taking his eyes off the boy in front of him. His lips quirk. “You can go home if you want. I don’t think I’ll be done here anytime soon.”

The boy raises his eyebrows, both at once, the corner of his mouth curling up. Flashing lights reflect off the glitter particles on his cheek, throwing colorful sparks back at Seoho and he traces them with his eyes. Traces down the curve of his cheek, the soft skin of his neck where he knows his blood flows, sweet stream of red. He can almost see the tiny veins under his skin, each alive and warm. The perfect imperfection of every living being, not yet shaped into spotless pristinity by death’s awful hands. He doesn’t see Geonhak leave.

“So what are you planning to do, then, if you’re not done here yet?”

It’s a provocative question, the sort of step in the right direction Seoho has been waiting for. It’s been too long, far too long, since he has last had the pleasure of drinking from someone intimately, of drinking from a warm body outside of the sterile rooms of the hospital’s volunteer center.

But he still doesn’t like taking the first step. Not for shyness, but because he can never be too sure.

“I don’t know yet. Maybe we should just see where this leads us.”

“Or perhaps.” The boy leans forward until he crowds into Seoho’s space, lips puckering into a smile, and Seoho can feel a smile creeping onto his own face, too. His breath fans over Seoho’s face, he smells like cheap drinks and the juicy velvet of his blood. “Perhaps you could stop playing dumb, and take me home.”

And here they are, hands still against Seoho’s shoulders, not quite pushing him away, but frozen.

He has Dongju — that’s his name, he gasped it out when Seoho asked and pressed his lips against his neck and breathed in deep, musky smell of sweat and perfume mixing with the scent of the blood there — wrapped in one arm and pressed against the grimy outside wall of the club, and he was just thinking things were going well until —

Until Dongju slid his hands up his torso to cling onto him and stuck his tongue in his mouth, running it along his teeth. It caught on one of Seoho’s fangs and the thick taste of his blood filled Seoho’s mouth for a moment, punching the unnecessary oxygen out of his lungs and making him go lightheaded — until Dongju drew away with a startled gasp half a second later, putting distance between their faces and staring at him, eyes going round.

“What do you mean, what the hell.” Seoho coughs, trying to clear his head. “I thought you knew.”

“How was I supposed to know that?” Dongju takes a hand away from Seoho’s shoulder, but only to wipe a drop of blood off his lip. The other stays where it is. “I thought you were just some dude! Were you going to _kill_ me?”

“Of course not. You think I would leave with someone thinking they know I’m a vampire and then just kill them?” All the sparks he saw in Dongju’s eyes, the little knowing smiles at everything Seoho said and did — he really thought Dongju counted two and two together and still came to the conclusion to not want to leave.

Dongju, though, blinks at him rather confusedly. “What _were_ your intentions with this, then?”

“Well, I don’t think they’re very different from yours.” If he still could, Seoho thinks this would be a situation in which even he would blush. “Maybe with a fun extra added, but altogether I think we were going for the same thing.”

A tiny frown creases Dongju forehead, as if hesitant to believe him. Perhaps he is — if he was under the impression that he was going to sleep with a regular man, it must come as rather much of a shock that he was sucking face with an undead being the whole time, tongue dangerously close to razor sharp teeth.

But his hand still rests against Seoho’s shoulder, fingers curling into his shirt there. He’s not pushing him away, he’s not pulling away entirely, he stays hovering in a weird space in between.

Until finally, he seems to come to a conclusion. His frown smoothes out, his hand curls against Seoho’s shoulder to pull him closer, face back up in his space. He’s only a little bit shorter than Seoho. “Well, as long as you aren’t gonna kill me, I see no reason why we should stop here. Carry on.”

The laugh that bubbles out of Seoho echoes down the street for a second. “Wow, someone’s desperate.”

Dongju rolls his eyes, but a smile sneaks onto his lips despite visible attempts to suppress it. “I just really don’t want to go back in there and look for another person. I already got left once tonight.”

Seoho thumbs at the lipstick stain on Dongju’s cheek. “Stupid people.”

Dongju grins, and his other hand comes up again to curl around the back of Seoho’s neck. “Well, I definitely know of a way for you to heal that crack in my ego right now.” He pulls Seoho’s face down towards him until their lips almost touch, and adds, “And for the record, I’m not just desperate. I also think this would be kind of hot.”

Seoho grins right as Dongju meets his lips. Their teeth clack, but by now their kissing has grown far too hungry for either of them to care. Dongju sticks to him like glued on, drawing impossibly closer, hands firmly fisting into his clothes and pulling. Seoho wraps his arms tighter around him, like trying to break him, though he’s very careful not to do just that. Dongju is so warm, his mouth tastes like velvety life, but that also means he’s breakable. Fragile.

Seoho can’t stop smiling, almost laughing, into their kisses. Dongju grabs his head to kiss him harder and to try and get him to behave, but Seoho eventually pulls away from him completely.

“As much as I would like this to continue,” he says, placing a tiny peck on Dongju’s lips when he chases after him, almost as if to placate him, “We should maybe move out of this alley. I would take you home, but it’s kind of far, so —”

“I thought vampires were supposed to be so supernaturally fast.” Dongju raises his brows, provocatively again.

“I mean, yes, but you aren’t —”

“You could carry me. I thought you were also supposed to be so strong.” Sweet poison, every word that leaves his mouth drips with it, seeps into Seoho. It only makes him roll his eyes, though, and a grin takes over his face.

Dongju climbs on his back, locking his legs around his stomach and his arms around his neck and resting his chin on his own arm. He looks almost too comfortable when Seoho tries to look at him from his peripheral, cheek squished against the fabric of his shirt and shooting Seoho a pleased smile. Seoho snorts under his breath.

What a little prince.

He takes off down the street.

“What the fuck,” is the first thing Dongju says when Seoho lets him hop off his back in his bedroom. One of his bedrooms, rather, on the highest floor of the house. It’s not where he usually sleeps, but the cold stone tiles of the floor are covered with fluffy rugs, thick curtains keep out the cold, and the soft bedding provides adequate warmth. The cold does not bother him, so most of the other rooms in the house would be far too cold for a human.

Seoho raises his head to look at Dongju. “What?”

Dongju spins around, taking in the room. His hand runs along one of the smooth stone walls, and he turns around again to look at Seoho, mouth hanging open. “This is not where you live, now, is it?”

“Of course it is.” Seoho laughs. “You think I would go to all that trouble to carry you all the way here only for this to not be my home? I could have also just taken you to a dingy motel downtown then.”

Dongju isn’t even looking at him anymore, though. He’s moved over to the bed, seeming fascinated by the throw blanket spread out on it. It glides through his fingers when he lifts it up, pure silk. “Is this some weird rich vampire lord cliche I’ve walked into?” he asks, and Seoho laughs. Shrugs. Maybe it is. “No normal person is this rich.”

“I’m not a normal person,” Seoho offers. “Wealth collects like dust the longer you live, I guess.”

“I don’t think I even want to ask how old you are.” Dongju shakes his head. He lifts the blanket as if to show it to Seoho, face unbelieving. “I also don’t think it would be in any way appropriate to fuck on this.”

“You have no qualms about fucking a vampire, but you meet your limit at doing it on a silk blanket.”

“Well, we’re going to ruin it if we do.” He sounds almost distraught. “This looks like it’s worth half my yearly rent, I’m not about to ruin it just because neither of us can keep it in our pants.”

“We can set it aside, if that’ll make you feel better,” Seoho relents, taking the blanket from Dongju’s loose grip to fold it up and set it down on a cabinet to the side. “Is there anything else you want to complain about, or.”

Dongju reaches out and _pinches_ him. Seoho yelps and clamps his hand over the spot on his arm. It doesn’t really hurt, of course, but it still surprised him.

“Don’t make fun of me.” Dongju pouts, pink lips pushing forward, still swollen from the impact of Seoho’s. His eyes narrow down, throwing long shadows across his cheeks where his eyelashes nearly touch them. Not for the first time does Seoho think that he looks almost too perfect to be alive. “I’m just trying to be considerate.”

Seoho knows, and he appreciates it. Dongju is cute like this, standing in the middle of the room almost shyly. Almost. His hands dangle by his sides, fingers twitching like he longs to cling onto something. He doesn’t move, but his eyes are alert, like they were back at the club. Not drunk at all, despite the drinks he had. He looks at Seoho with the same kind of hunger he had half an hour ago, like he wants to take him apart.

It makes Seoho miss the fire they had, that burned between them before they left.

He sheds his jacket, lets it drop to the floor, and sits down on the bed. Dongju’s eyebrows raise, and he steps closer, almost seeming like an instinct. He always pulls closer to Seoho, puts his hand in the one Seoho reaches out for him, lets himself be pulled onto the mattress as well. He gives, but it’s not a victory for Seoho. A push and pull.

His eyes are wide, take in Seoho’s every move. He folds his legs under himself, but he doesn’t fold.

“There’s one more thing we need to talk about before we do this, I think it’s better if we get it off the table right away,” Seoho starts, making sure Dongju is looking at him. He doesn’t normally like to get serious right before he sleeps with someone, but since Dongju didn’t know he was a vampire until he was this deep in — “Are you willing to let me bite you? Because I did go out with the intention of, you know, food, before I ran into you. I’m not going to if you don’t want me to, but if you would, that —” his voice goes rough at this, embarrassingly — “That would be nice.”

Dongju cocks his head to the side, eyes sparking up in the exact way Seoho has already become familiar too. This is where he takes over again, where he shows how little he folds under the weight of Seoho’s gaze. A smile curls around his mouth, and this is a game to him. A game for his life perhaps, and Seoho loves that

“I don’t think I’m just willing to let you bite me,” he says, and Seoho almost deflates, mind racing to figure out how much longer he can go without feeding, until Dongju adds, “I _want_ you to bite me.”

Seoho’s eyes flit up to his face, and he’s smiling in a very particular way, almost amused, brow raised.

“A friend of mine got bitten once, I imagine in a similar situation, and he said it was the horniest he’s ever been.”

A laugh rips out of Seoho at that, and he has to cover his mouth with how loud it is. Humans get a rush out of being bitten, Seoho remembers it himself. The venom of their teeth mixing into their bloodstream sends them higher than the clouds, and there are people genuinely addicted to it — most of the people that frequent those illegal blood banks are, Seoho would argue. He also knows that those places have bedrooms for this purpose.

“I can’t promise that that will be the effect, but I’ve indeed been told that it feels really good.”

Dongju’s eyes almost glow, mouth bending into a smile that almost makes him look hungry. “Well, what are we waiting for? Even if it doesn’t make me horny, I still want to have experienced it at least once. And we can still fuck.”

Seoho laughs again, pulling him in by his hand to press a kiss to his lips. “You’re awful.”

Dongju smiles, but his eyes don’t pull along. They’re filled with a hunger, now, clearly knowing what he wants, staring at Seoho’s lips and the sharp teeth that lie behind them. “I think you like it,” he says, and he’s right.

Seoho loves humans, and he loves them even more when they know what they want. When they love a bit of danger, dance on burning bridges and are so violently alive it almost hurts to watch them. Dongju is alive with every breath he takes, every beat of his heart, fluttering in his chest so loud Seoho can hear it when he inches a hand up his thigh, pulls at the seam of his sweater. And yet, he’s willing to play with it, to risk it for a rush.

Seoho loves humans that smile the way Dongju does, pretty in the soft light of his bedroom, but oh so dangerous. Dongju is not something to be played with, he’s not a toy. He’s fragile like all humans are, breakable and vulnerable, Seoho could bite too hard, too long, and he would be gone. But he knows what he wants, wretches his hand away.

He would have every vampire lord begging at his feet before he would ever let one of them hurt him.

The more of an honor is it when he pushes his hands under his own sweater and lifts it over his head, leaving flawless skin in its wake. He takes Seoho’s hand, lying limp between them, puts it against his shoulder, and he looks at him. Open, expectant. Like he waits for Seoho to take the next step.

“Which way would you be the most comfortable?” Seoho asks, and he burns hot at how hoarse he sounds.

Dongju crawls closer, swinging his leg over Seoho’s lap and sitting down on his hips. He grabs his face between both of his hands and kisses him — but it’s almost gentle, careful. His lips shake against Seoho’s.

“You don’t have to be scared,” Seoho says lowly, running a hand along the line of Dongju’s hip. “I’ve bitten enough people to know when to stop. I’ll be very careful.”

“I’m not scared,” Dongju whispers back, making Seoho smile when he tilts his head to the side.

It gives him access to the long expanse of his neck, spotless skin broken up by tiny acne scars at the back of his neck, the hair fading off standing up when Seoho closes the distance between them, breath fanning over the skin and raising goosebumps. He kissed this spot earlier, and he remembers the distinct smell.

The breath in Dongju’s throat audibly hitches when he puts his lips against the warm skin, he can feel the jump. His heart pumps faster, too, his pulse races against the pucker of Seoho’s lips.

So close to what his body craves the most, it makes him lightheaded, makes his mouth water. But he waits.

“Get on with it,” Dongju hisses above him, and Seoho grins, teeth touching skin.

This is it. He wraps both of his arms around Dongju’s middle, pulls him closer until his back arches, and he opens his mouth. The last time he drank directly from a human was months ago, he’s been surviving off of blood bags to let the onslaught of baby vampires have the volunteers in the feeding center, blood is more nurturing when it’s still warm.

And the last time he drank from a human outside of the strictly regulated hospital rooms, where they drug him up to lower his venom production and let the volunteer go unscathed, was probably years ago.

Every second is to be treasured — his teeth breach Dongju’s skin with no resistance, and he gasps in pain as they cut into him. A whine builds in his throat under Seoho’s mouth, and he has to hold him tighter to stop him from squirming away and making everything worse by tearing away under Seoho’s teeth. He can almost feel the venom dripping off his teeth and reach Dongju’s bloodstream, and he can pinpoint the exact moment its effect kicks in — Dongju sags in his hold, his whining turns from pained to something else entirely. He’s gasping, still, but not in pain.

Seoho removes his teeth from his skin, sucks at the wounds, relishes in the sweet velvet flushing his mouth. It’s so smooth, tastes incredibly sweet, and he has no idea if it’s because he hasn’t fed in so long, or if it’s Dongju.

Above him, Dongju’s whines get louder, he gasps harder, but the pain he hears in it stems from somewhere other than his neck. His hips twitch in Seoho’s hold, rutting against him where their bodies meet. He’s so warm, moving against Seoho, unable to hold back with the venom rushing exactly where he wanted it to go, it drives him insane.

Seoho puts a hand against the small of his back, guides the sloppy movement of his hips. He finishes drinking, licks up the last droplets of blood, lets his saliva seal up the wounds and kisses the spot until Dongju keens.

“It’s okay.” A trail of kisses up the length of his neck, he finds his way back up to Dongju’s face, kissing along his jaw and across his cheek, around the corners of his lips. “Okay? What do you need me to do?”

He’s not sure if Dongju can form words, some garbled noises leaving his mouth when he opens it. But he moves with intent still, hands pulling at Seoho’s shirt until he pulls it off himself, and Dongju’s hands settle against his shoulders, fingers digging into the flesh so hard it would bruise if it could.

Everything he does, every movement of his warm body against his own makes heat coil in Seoho’s guts. He has no instant horny substance coursing through his veins, but he has a lapful of the prettiest boy he has met in a long while, rutting against him and gasping when he just moves his hand on his back, and he may not need anything else.

Dongju latches back onto his lips, kisses him so hard that it’s hard to believe he’s too out of it to even speak. He kisses with intent, pries Seoho’s lips open with his own and bites into his mouth, pushes him back with the impact of it. His hands slide further up, into Seoho’s hair, curling into the strands, _pulling_. His hips snap forward sharply, building pressure against Seoho’s crotch, a weird heat rushing through his still veins.

And he’s still making those damned noises, building in his throat so fast they sound like sobs, even as he drowns them in Seoho’s mouth. He burns in Seoho’s arms, now, and it only makes Seoho run hotter, too.

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” he utters lowly, detaching from Dongju’s lips. He runs his hands up his chest, over burning skin so smooth it almost hurts to touch, like burning glass. Runs them over his nipples, pressing down on them again and again until Dongju arches his back and keens so high in his throat it nearly makes Seoho’s ears pop.

His lips find their way back down to Dongju’s jaw, back down his neck, where the healing wound still lies. He kisses around it, licks over it. It must be so sensitive.

Dongju thrashes, his grinding sloppier and a word leaving his mouth that Seoho can’t understand through the sobs breaking out of him, not really sobs, but garbled moans. And when Seoho closes his mouth over the wound and sucks, no blood coming out, while pinching both of his nipples, Dongju’s hips push down against his, stilling, firm.

He makes no sound, his face screws up and his hips begin to ruck again, ever so slightly. Seoho reaches down between his legs to help him through it, palming him through his pants, growing damp at the front.

When it’s over, Dongju sinks against him, breathing hard. His head rests against Seoho’s shoulder, his legs weirdly fold against Seoho’s when he sinks to the side, and he’s hiccuping under his panting breaths.

“Shh,” Seoho attempts to soothe him, lowering him down onto the bed. “It’s okay.”

“What the fuck,” Dongju curses breathlessly, flopping fully down on the mattress by himself and spreading his arms. “What the fuck, that was so intense. I don’t think I’ve ever been like _this_ on the first time.”

Seoho laughs, shuffling up to look at his face, and Dongju smiles up at him. “I told you it feels good.”

“I think good may be underselling it a bit.” Dongju laughs, going to swat at Seoho’s chest but instead he hooks his hand over his shoulder to pull himself up and smack a kiss on his lips. “Give me one second, I’ll be right with you.”

“It’s okay, I can take care of this myself. You rest.”

Seoho sits back to just shove his hand down his pants and finish this for himself, but Dongju pushes himself back up and shakes his head. He takes his own pants off to get rid of the sticky mess, and crawls closer to Seoho.

“Absolutely not, what kind of awful hook up would I be?” His hand rests against Seoho’s shoulder for a split second before he pushes him back by it, crawls after him and captures Seoho’s lips with his own again. They taste even sweeter now that Seoho knows his taste so intimately, melt soft against his mouth.

Dongju’s hands travel down his sides, fingers hook under his pants, undo the button and the zipper and pull them down, all while his mouth never leaves Seoho’s, tongue running along his teeth. More carefully this time.

Seoho barely has time to adjust before Dongju wraps a quick hand around his cock, moving way too fast, nimble fingers working around him and he’s pushing his hips up into the air within seconds, just so holding back a whine.

Dongju tuts, moving away from their kiss to click his tongue and press a sweet kiss to Seoho’s nose before he moves down. Down his chest, pressing his hot tongue to Seoho’s nipple and almost making him jump off the bed, sinking his dull teeth into the thin skin of Seoho’s hip before he moves on, further down.

The heat in his belly returns full force, burning even hotter, coiling even tighter. Dongju’s tongue touches the tip of his cock, hot and alive, and it nearly drives Seoho up the wall with impatience. His hips twitch upwards, and Dongju pins him to the mattress with his hand. Of course he doesn’t hold a candle to the supernatural strength buried in Seoho, but the greater strength lies in the way he reduces Seoho to a puddle of his self, too out of it with the need to release the heat in his guts to even try and fight against him. He catches Dongju smiling to himself.

He does properly go down on Seoho, though, finally. His mouth closes around the head of his cock, so warm and wet it makes Seoho want to scream — so he does. The moan he lets out when Dongju sinks down is inhuman, louder than anything he’d ever admit to, and his hands curl into his sheets to his sides.

At least Dongju doesn’t seem keen on drawing it out, either. He must be tired, drained of both blood and energy after that orgasm, so he hollows out his cheeks and sucks, working his hand around what he can’t comfortably reach.

It doesn’t take long, mostly because Seoho was already so worked up, and he still has those images of Dongju stuck in his head — in his lap, clinging to him, arching his back with how bad he needed it, thrashing under his grip. The sweetness of his blood on Seoho’s tongue, the way he reacted to Seoho going over his wound again. The way his quick tongue and sparking eyes were reduced to nothing but a mess just like that. So easily.

Seoho comes, whining high in his throat, seeing white for a moment and he damn near loses his mind when the first thing he sees is Dongju catching most of his release on his tongue, swallowing and licking up what he missed.

Sitting back and wiping his mouth, Dongju says, “I assume vampires don’t really carry STIs, now, do you?”

Seoho shakes his head, a little too out of breath to talk. He looks up to find Dongju smiling, clearly pleased with himself, and he can’t help but laugh. “God, you’re the devil,” he curses, trying to kick him.

“Am I?” His eyes go round and pretty in the blink of an eye, it almost leaves Seoho breathless again. But then Dongju laughs, pushing at Seoho’s thigh and rolling over to properly spread out on the bed. “Kidding. Call me whatever you want as long as you, I don’t know, get me some water soon or something.”

“Oh, holy shit.” Seoho sits up, scrambling to pull his pants up again. “I almost forgot. Let me get you something to eat before you faint on me.”

Dongju laughs, looking rather well even as Seoho leaves the room, but he doesn’t miss the faint sway to his posture. He flies down the halls even quicker.

“I still can’t believe you live here.” Dongju is properly positioned on the velvety pillow, now, blanket tucked around his shoulders to keep him warm, and he’s staring up at the high ceiling. An empty plate and two drained juice boxes sit on the table next to the bed, an attempt to get some iron back into his system that seems to have worked.

He seems tired, of course. He lost blood and then promptly afterwards had what he claims was one of the best orgasms of his life, so it’s no wonder that his eyes droop and the patterns his fingers draw get sloppier.

Seoho lies next to him, propped up, watching him. “Why can’t you believe it?”

“I don’t know.” He shrugs. “It’s such a fancy place, very high end. I didn’t even know these kinds of buildings still exist around here. This looks like a period drama setting.” He blinks, then, looking up at Seoho in what looks like sudden panic. “Where even are we? How far away from home did you take me?”

Seoho laughs. “Not that far. We’re just out of town. It’d probably take you a while to get back on foot, but I can take you home if you want. After you’ve rested a little, I’m not making you go through that before you’ve slept.”

“Okay mom.” Dongju rolls his eyes, smile pulling at his lips, but his eyes nearly fall shut again.

It’s silent for a while, conversation simmering in Seoho’s head while Dongju drifts in and out of sleep next to him, his eyes fluttering back open every now and then, and Seoho doesn’t dare move too much for fear of rousing him.

He feels better, blood in his system and warming his body from the inside out. The awful monster inside of him is sated for the moment, sleeping peacefully in his tummy instead of tearing at his insides. He knows it will wake up again in the not so far future, and he will have to find another way to feed. His eyes travel down to Dongju’s resting body, the bruising at the side of his neck. His blood was so delicious, so refreshing. Who will ever compare to that?

But he can’t ask anything else of Dongju, not now. He did what he was here for. He’s going to leave soon enough.

But right as he thinks that, Dongju’s eyes flutter open once more, and this time, his mouth opens, too. “What if I just don’t leave?” he asks, words slurring with fatigue, but his eyes are wide awake when he looks at Seoho.

“What do you mean?” Seoho asks, amused. Of course he has to leave, he has a life to live.

Dongju blows up his cheeks. “I think I like it here. You haven’t killed me yet, and considering that I was more or less completely helpless at your mercy about an hour ago, I don’t think you’re going to. You fed me, let me sleep in your bed, and you’re a lot nicer than my brother. And that was a _really_ good orgasm, and we didn’t even really fuck.”

Seoho laughs, can’t resist reaching out and pushing Dongju’s fluffy fringe up. “Do you live with your brother?”

“Unfortunately.” He sighs. “We don’t normally, but he lost his job and then his hot roommate moved out, so he couldn’t afford his rent anymore. He’s been sleeping on my couch for a couple of weeks until he finds a new job and a new place to live. We’re twins, too, so it’s extra annoying. I thought I got rid of him when we moved out from home.”

Seoho can tell he’s not really serious, if only from the way his mouth pulls up as if to smile at the last part. “Twins, hm?” he asks, just to tease. Dongju’s eyes flit up to him like a warning. “So there’s two of you?”

Dongju smiles. “Fraternal twins. He looks nothing like me, some people don’t believe we’re even brothers.”

“A damn shame,” Seoho says, and it makes Dongju laugh. “But I guess it makes sense. You’re so pretty, it would be unfair and also a danger to the balance of the universe if someone like you existed twice.”

Dongju swats at his shoulder, laughing. “Oh god, you’re so greasy. Maybe I _am_ leaving, after all.”

They both laugh, and Seoho dives over to dig his fingers into Dongju’s sides, in the spots that he knows make most people scream. Dongju wiggles away from him, fighting off his hands, still thrashing and nearly choking on his playful whines when Seoho just plops down on top of him, holding him down in a hug.

“Wasn’t I supposed to rest?” Dongju asks, a little breathless.

Seoho hums into his chest, makes no plans to move away from him. “You can rest like this,” he informs him, settling comfortably with his head stuck under Dongju’s chin. “You’re comfy and you smell good.”

To his surprise, Dongju doesn’t complain any further, and not a minute later, a warm hand travels up Seoho’s back, coming to rest at the back of Seoho’s neck, holding him in place, gently.

His breath evens out above him, slowly, and Seoho lets his own eyes fall shut, too.

There is a next time. And a time after that, and many, many times after that. And at some point, Seoho almost feels like Dongju is at his place more often than he is not.

Dongju writes his phone number down on a small pink note before he leaves in the morning after that first night, and Seoho texts it, just because he’s curious. He’s half expecting it to be a fake number Dongju only left to be polite, but then he replies, and then he texts Seoho in the middle of the night to ask if he can come over.

Seoho is never going to say no to that, and suddenly Dongju is there all the time.

It’s not even just for sex, not even just so Dongju can act as Seoho’s walking blood bag. Sometimes they just hang out, cuddle in one of Seoho’s beds, take walks around the estate, play video games on the consoles in the living room. Seoho teaches him the wonders of online gaming, and then he teaches him to play like a pro, and in return he sits through so many TV show marathons with Dongju, and he takes him out to see a musical once.

They cook, almost set the kitchen on fire, and on the few occasions that Seoho visits Dongju at his small downtown apartment, Dongju orders fast food for them because he insists anyone in the city has to eat it.

But the bites on Dongju’s body get more, each leaving a fine silver scar in the shape of Seoho’s teeth, some broken up again and again. Dongju doesn’t seem to care — he only covers his neck when there’s a fresh and bruising bite on it when he has to leave the house. The scars don’t seem to bother him.

Dongmyeong, on the other hand, gives Seoho suspicious looks the few times they meet at Dongju’s apartment.

“Don’t worry about him,” Dongju says when Seoho tells him about it, face planted firmly into Seoho’s shoulder. He smells faintly of sweat, like he always does after work. “He’s always this annoying. With everyone.”

Seoho raises an eyebrow. “Very protective?” Dongmyeong did not exactly strike him as the most caring or overly protective kind of brother, not even like he was very fond of Dongju in general apart from normal brotherly interaction.

“Not even so much, he just thinks relationships in general are a waste of time and energy. So he’s both being a little piss baby because he’s worried I’m hurting myself but he would never admit that he is, and because he thinks I shouldn’t be wasting my time and my perfectly good heart on a man, anyway.”

Dongju continues to talk about his brother and whatever annoying habits he likes to display in his home, but Seoho simply started blanking out at the word _relationships_ , can barely hear him over the racing of his own thoughts.

Are they in a relationship? Is Dongju his boyfriend? They never quite put a label on what they’re doing, and Seoho considers himself a bit too old to care much about the definitions humans like to put on the way they behave around other people, maybe something one transcends after a certain while of being alive. But something about the thought of Dongju considering him his boyfriend sends him into a small spiral.

Humans have terms for everything, small things and big things. The small things stop mattering once you’ve been alive for longer than you should have been, and the big things just grow into one big thing.

But now there’s this boy pressing his face into his shoulder, just where the skin grows softer under the hard cut of his collarbone, and he’s telling stories about his family into the fabric of his sweater — and Seoho _cares_ , all of the sudden. Because when the sun sets, Dongju won’t leave. He will sink back into the mattress with a near delicate sigh and he will all too willingly surrender his sanity so Seoho can sink his fangs into him and feed. He will thread his fingers into Seoho’s hair and hold him there, by the vulnerable spot on his neck, because he’s learned to fight the venom enough to stay lucid, and they will move in sync because there’s no desperation to get off anymore.

Dongju enjoys what they do together, Seoho can see it in the glow on his cheeks when they’re done. And he cares, too, maybe in different ways than Seoho does, but he offers him his blood not only for the goal of getting a good orgasm, but because he knows Seoho needs it, and he wants him to be comfortable.

He’s just there, blood sweet like cherries, filling up every inch of Seoho’s mouth when he presses close to him, while the rest of him floods every other of Seoho’s senses. His voice, purring low in his ear, the laugh he lets out in the middle of Seoho’s kitchen when the light catches on the tips of his hair. The very human way in which he sneezes when he looks at the sun. His gentle sleep, curled up in Seoho’s bed, the snarky tone of his voice he uses both when he talks about his brother and when he sticks his tongue out at Seoho over dinner. The fact that he kisses the same way that he fucks, with purpose, knowing what he wants, enjoying. Almost relaxing in the way he’s so sure, trusting.

Seoho doesn’t ask him what it all means that night. He doesn’t ask weeks later, hoisting Dongju onto his arms and carrying him up the stairs, he doesn’t ask all the times they fuck without any biting prefacing it. The times when Dongju’s eyes stay completely clear, and he pushes Seoho down on the mattress with that glint in his eyes, light catching on his teeth when he smiles, hands pressing hard enough to bruise if Seoho could.

He doesn’t ask when they kiss in the kitchen, dance in the living room, go out for cheesy dates.

A year passes without Seoho noticing, and time keeps running. He shows up to the dinner with Dongju’s coworkers that Dongju invites him to, and they walk arm in arm in the cold.

The volunteers at the hospital are surprised to see him again when Dongju and Dongmyeong go home to visit their parents for two weeks, and tell him they worried about him. Dongju sends him pictures of his face and his family and Dongmyeong and their little home town what seems like every five minutes, and promises he’ll be back soon.

It’s a weird feeling, missing someone. Seoho is used to seeing most of his close friends once a year, at most. But Dongju has only been gone for a little over a week, and for the first time in decades, Seoho is _lonely_.

He doesn’t tell him that, and he still doesn’t ask what it means when he picks him up from the airport. Dongju plants a kiss on his lips before he even waves Dongmyeong goodbye, and while his mind races, warming his cheeks, Seoho dives over to stick his cold fingers into the back of Dongju’s shirt. It makes him screech, wiggling to get away from him, a laugh dancing on his face. Seoho captures his laugh between his lips.

Maybe things don’t really matter all that much, after all.

“Can you even suck dick with those teeth?”

Dongju’s fingers curl around Seoho’s chin, tilting his face up, thumb digging into his lips until they part, and he looks at his teeth so intently it makes Seoho squirm. His thumb runs along the tip of his fang, just lightly enough to not break the skin, a taste of what he wants so close to where he needs it, teasing if it weren’t for his innocent face.

“You’d be surprised,” Seoho says around the finger in his mouth, raising his eyebrow when he can’t smirk.

They’re in another one of his bedrooms, one without silky bedding, without fluffy rugs on the floor. Goosebumps raise on Dongju’s skin as Seoho watches, and he can’t tell if it’s the cold or arousal at the implication of Seoho’s words. He has stacked a few extra blankets on the table by their side, just in case.

Dongju’s eyes spark when they next meet Seoho’s, thighs spreading just that bit more to let Seoho settle between them. It’s an almost instinctual gesture by now, it seems, and Seoho finds the warmth of his body is familiar.

It almost feels like coming home when their bodies align and he presses butterfly kisses to Dongju’s chest.

“Why don’t you show me?” Dongju sounds breathless, his throat constricting with every kiss Seoho presses to his skin, soft ripple of the muscles of his chest under his mouth — Seoho watches his adam’s apple bop as he scrapes his teeth across his skin oh so gently, not enough to break. Dongju’s hips twitch against his hand.

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Seoho asks, lips now curling into a smirk that he knows drives Dongju mad every time, as if every little noise Dongju makes, coming right from the back of his throat every time Seoho so much as touches him, doesn’t go straight to his head. He’s not slipping, his eyes stay awake, and Seoho likes that even more. Likes breaking him down himself. “I know you too well, Ju. You get off on danger, else you wouldn’t even be here.”

Dongju hisses when Seoho digs into his hip, pushing him further up the bed. He likes being pushed around, too, Seoho knows, even if he would never admit it. And Seoho is aware that he could do this with any human, really, if he wanted to, they’re all fragile and breakable in his hands, but something about this being Dongju makes him go crazy.

Something about the fact that he knows Dongju _likes_ being treated like this, too, drives him mad.

It’s not always like this. Dongju doesn’t like letting him win this easily, normally, only when he’s in a mood. He likes a bit of a fight, and he does win occasionally, both of Seoho’s wrists caught in his hand, pinned to the bed.

Seoho likes that equation, too, likes Dongju breaking him down in just the way he already fantasized about when he first met him. Blunt teeth sinking into the flesh of Seoho’s thigh, firm enough to hurt and drive his hips into the air with a keen, but never enough to break the marble of his skin in the way Seoho does with him.

Seoho has never known a human like him, a push and pull of what he wants, what he gets, everything at once.

Dongju’s hips twitch, now, when Seoho kisses along the jut of his hip bone, teeth always scraping, a tease, pinning him to the bedding with his hands, because he knows Dongju will hurt himself otherwise.

“Get on with it, then,” Dongju hisses from between gritted teeth. “If you know me so well.”

“Mhh,” Seoho makes, removing his mouth from Dongju’s body altogether to look up at him. His hand keeps on stroking the skin, though, drawing featherlight patterns into the soft warmth, while the other holds him down, still, keeps him from bucking after the sensation. It only serves to draw Dongju’s frown tighter, lips shaking. “No, I think you like it like this. I think you like the thought that I can take you apart just like that, and you’d be helpless.”

Dongju whines, so softly, under his breath, biting his lip to keep it from leaking out, but Seoho hears him. A smile takes over his face, because Dongju is so cute, and because he knows how this will end.

He decides to have mercy, though, at least a little bit. His hands dance down to where Dongju needs him the most, fingers grazing the skin until he keens, hips canting up, and he bows down again to kiss his tummy. He’s so soft there, everywhere, the curve of his belly and the insides of his thighs, smooth skin in the golden light. Seoho can smell the blood rushing under those planes of skin, when even his chest flushes, heart beating way too loud. He can feel his pulse below the vulnerable skin spanning his hips, the way heat must pool in him when Seoho finally wraps his fingers around his cock, just holding it for a moment, until Dongju begins to thrash against him.

Seoho decides to give in — he could hold him down with no problem, force him to stay still, but he hates using his full strength on Dongju for fear of hurting him, his fragile human bones. And Dongju is openly whining now, though lowly, sounds growing more desperate with every second Seoho spends unmoving.

He moves his hand, finally, when his head, too, begins to swim. Heat coils in him with every Dongju does, every twitch of his hips, every noise that he makes, it all goes straight to his lower regions, driving him mad.

Dongju moans way too loudly, hissing an ungrateful sounding, “ _Thank_ you,” and Seoho smiles.

“Now, you wanna see how well I can suck dick with these teeth?” Seoho asks, raising an eyebrow when Dongju catches his eyes, but he cuts off an answer by twisting his fist around the tip of Dongju’s cock, turning into a moan.

Tongue curling over his lower fangs, he wastes no more time. Dongju’s cock is heavy in his mouth, but it slides down his tongue with ease, and he goes fully down on it in one swift movement, nose hitting the plane of Dongju’s lower abdomen as he swallows around it, and Dongju _screams_.

His legs twitch, thighs trying to close around Seoho’s head, and Seoho has to hold them open. He sobs with every bop of Seoho’s head, every movement of his tongue, moans turning desperate and words stolen from his mouth. No trace of his snarky comments, no ungrateful teasing, all that leaves his lips are sobs and begs for more and _please, hyung, Seoho hyung, please_ — as Seoho wraps a hand around the base of his cock.

Seoho tries to remain as calm as he can, but he knows he’s painfully hard, too, burning inside at everything Dongju does, and it’s a bit shameful to admit that just sucking someone off turns him on this much, but it’s _Dongju_.

He moans when Dongju reaches down to thread his hands into his hair and _pulls_ , the vibrations of it making Dongju’s hips twitch even more as a long moan leaves his lips. Seoho doesn’t even try to hold him down anymore, he lets his jaw go slack and takes Dongju fucking up into his throat, likely too out of it to even notice what he’s doing.

There is no holding back, no gentleness in either of their movements. Dongju cants his hips up, chases what he wants, takes it, and they both fall apart. Seoho ruts against the mattress, trying to get any kind of friction, whining when his own pants prevent him from getting it, and the sound riles Dongju up even more — he holds onto Seoho’s hair even tighter, his other hand curling into the bedding, and he sobs as he snaps his hips upwards.

Seoho tries to hold him down again, attempts to regain a bit of control, but there’s no use. His own hands are shaking, his hips twitch every time Dongju’s dick hits the back of his throat, and he has to let go, swirls his tongue around what he can reach of his cock, just for the satisfaction of hearing Dongju cry out his name.

When Dongju comes, long and hard and with a high whine from the back of his throat, coating the inside of Seoho’s throat with warmth, Seoho is still rutting against the mattress, trying to get off.

Dongju flops back against the bedding, boneless, but he must have noticed Seoho’s desperation, because he crawls over to him not a second later, hands grabbing at his shoulders to turn him around.

Seoho obeys, flipping on his back, and lips crash into his. Dongju has always kissed like this — too fast and too desperate, nothing like he seems outside of the bedroom, pressing in fast and taking what he needs. His hands run up to Seoho’s shoulders, his neck, thumbs digging into the soft skin of his neck behind the edges of his jaw, holding.

Spit still connects their lips in a long string when Dongju pulls back to say, “You can fuck me if you want.”

Seoho stalls for a moment, stalls. They’ve never — and also — “But you just —” His mind doesn’t seem to be able to produce any coherent thoughts, not when he was so close until a minute ago. He blinks up at Dongju dumbly.

Fingers dig into his cheeks, and Dongju coos at him. “You’re so sweet,” he tells him. “Don’t worry. It’s okay.”

The same fingers make quick work of Seoho’s pants, pushing them down and discarding them to the side, to the rest of their clothes. He sits high on Seoho’s thighs, bowing down to press kisses to Seoho’s chest, hands trailing down his hips, touch so light that it makes Seoho kind of go mad, sending sparks up his spine.

“So do you want to?” Dongju asks, coming up again to hover in front of his face, just an inch between their lips. His breath tastes like minty toothpaste and thick velvety blood, and the monster inside Seoho’s tummy roars despite having fed yesterday. Dongju drives him crazy. “I can just get you off like this if you’re more comfortable with that, but I thought it would be a nice offer. I can definitely take it, don’t worry about me.”

Seoho doesn’t think that not worrying about Dongju is even an option anymore, but he also can’t say that he isn’t intrigued. In over one year of dating (are they dating?) they have done all kinds of things together, and Seoho has let Dongju fuck him a couple of times before, but he’s always been too afraid to do it the other way around — view point one. Of course, he never told Dongju that it’s because of that, he’s pretty sure Dongju would have his ass if he did, would let him know a piece of his mind if Seoho ever tried to treat him like a glass doll. But he still worries, secretly.

But now Dongju is hovering above him, so close, naked and so close to where he needs him, thighs spanning his hips, and the prospect of his hand doesn’t sound half as alluring. And the offer is out.

“Okay.” Seoho nods. “Okay, let’s — yes, let’s do that. Let me —”

Dongju laughs, pushes him back down by his chest when he tries to sit up. “No need to be so stressed about it, pretty boy. It will all be okay.” His eyes spark, like they did that very first night.

He retrieves the lube Seoho has stored in near every bedroom of the estate, much to their general convenience, and props himself up, one hand firm against Seoho’s chest to hold his balance while the other reaches behind him.

The way he does it, face contorting more in concentration than in pleasure, arm steadily working as his fingers undoubtedly spread him open, it looks so professional, like he knows exactly what he’s doing. Of course he does, Seoho thinks, mentally reprimanding himself. He has done this a million times, likely. Maybe.

He asks, because he can’t stop himself, “Do you — do you do this a lot?”

Dongju smiles, but he grows a bit pink around the edges nevertheless, and he hasn’t looked at him the whole time. “Mm, sometimes,” he says, pushing himself forward to get a better angle. Seoho watches, mesmerized, as his lips drop open, letting out a pant. “You won’t do it, so sometimes when I go home after this —”

It knocks the breath out of Seoho’s lungs, to think that Dongju would go home to touch himself, finger himself, perhaps to the thought of him, but he tries to remain composed, hands on Dongju’s thighs, waiting.

When he can’t take it anymore, hips near twitching with anticipation and mind running with all they could be doing, his hands sneak up to wind around Dongju’s hips, further to find his hand, the lube dripping off his finger —

Dongju slaps him away and squints down at him.

But when he’s finally done, pulling his fingers out and wiping them on the sheets — gone the times when he worried about ruining Seoho’s bedding — and he reaches down to spread lube over Seoho’s dick and also stroke him back to full hardness, he has Seoho back on the edge within seconds, and he knows he won’t last long.

It’s been too long of a night, too much of Dongju _everywhere_ , for him to have any hopes of lasting longer than a couple of minutes. Not like it would be embarrassing to come fast — only kind of — but it would be a damn shame.

Dongju lines him up and sinks down in one swift movement, seating himself on Seoho’s hips like it’s nothing, and Seoho throws his head back, can’t stop an embarrassing whine from spilling past his lips. It’s been too long since he last fucked a human, and he forgot how hot it is, literally scathing him, burning everywhere.

Dongju is tight around him, so tight Seoho can watch his face screw up in the pain it causes him, but he’s also warm — no, _burning hot_ — wet, so very much alive. The muscles in his belly constrict with the effort of holding himself up on Seoho’s cock, lips screwed shut to not let another sound past, but his own dick seems to take interest.

And then he lifts himself up, thighs hardening under Seoho’s grip, and slams back down.

They both groan, Dongju falls forward against him, holding himself up by placing his hands on Seoho’s shoulders and rolling his hips, rock hard against Seoho’s belly while he milks every little sound out of his throat.

It’s all so much — hot white and burning and poison seeping into Seoho’s bloodstream with every panted moan Dongju breathes out into the humid air of the room, and it aches in all the best kinds of ways. Dongju’s hips swivel on his cock, chasing his own pleasure, now, too, taking and taking, hands curling into Seoho’s flesh, blunt nails digging into skin as he rocks up and down, and it all sends Seoho up higher, makes the heat curl tighter.

Sweaty bangs pushed back over his head, Dongju’s forehead rests against Seoho’s, an inch separating their lips, and Seoho can almost feel the hungry press of his kisses, taste the sweetness of his lips, so unlike.

“Bite me,” Dongju hisses, presses a kiss to Seoho’s lips, almost too gently, and repeats himself, “Hyung. Bite me.”

“What?” Seoho asks, even though he heard him loud and clear, mind grappling to process what he said. He blinks up at him, opens his mouth to ask again, but Dongju slams his hips down sharply, cutting him off.

“I said bite me, hyung. _Please_.” The last word comes out like a plea, and it goes straight to Seoho’s cock.

And why would Seoho say no to that, with the smooth expanse of Dongju’s neck so close to his mouth, stretched so nicely when Dongju tilts his head to the side to give him the room he needs. He’s been awakening the monster in Seoho all night, heart beating loud, blood rushing thick and delicious under his skin.

So Seoho bites. Sharp teeth sink into soft skin, break it with ease, sweet blood filling his mouth. It runs down his tongue in a velvety slide, spills past his lips when Dongju moves on top of him and he moans.

And Dongju sobs as Seoho drinks from him, head thrown back so far it seems dangerous, hips rutting against him in a desperate attempt to get off again, slack in Seoho’s arms but his hips still moving with intent, less composure.

It’s finally too much, the sweet blood on his tongue and the sloppy grind of Dongju’s hips, the whines in his ear driving Seoho up the wall. He sits up, taking Dongju with him, and he wraps both of his arms around Dongju’s middle, pulls him close against his chest and snaps his hips up into him. Dongju cries out, and they set a pace like that. Seoho rocking up and Dongju rutting down, meeting in the middle until it’s too much.

Seoho licks across the wound on Dongju’s neck to seal it, and it makes Dongju clench around him, and that’s what finally does it — he comes inside of him, hard, riding it out by rocking into him.

Dongju follows not long after, with a hand curled around his own cock, helping himself through it.

Spent, Seoho lets himself fall back down, doesn’t even care when Dongju falls against his chest and stays there. He’s warm, like a cat curling against him, and his breath fans out against the skin of Seoho’s chest.

“You’re insane,” he tells him, and Dongju angles his head up just to grin at him.

They lie in silence for a while, Dongju likely half unconscious, just catching their breath before Seoho finally pushes himself up and sets Dongju down on the mattress next to him. Before he promptly collapses back into the fluffy pillows, Seoho manages to sneak a kiss to his lips, and gnaw on his earlobe — making sure to keep his fangs out of the way — until Dongju pushes him away, pouting like a child. He always gets like this, whiny.

“Fine, okay.” Seoho presses another kiss to the tip of his nose before he gets up. “Let’s get you warm and fed.”

Dongju sure doesn’t complain when Seoho lifts him up, although he swats at his chest and tells him to suck it up when Seoho whines the entire way down the stairs.

The front door falls shut with an audible click, accompanied by the telltale squeak of the hinges echoing through the hall, and Seoho looks up from his game, frowning. Normally Dongju would at least say goodbye.

But then there are steps on the stairs, and, “Uh. Seoho hyung?” Dongju’s voice.

Seoho shoots up off the couch, drops his controller somewhere on the floor, hurries out of the living room. There are more people in the house, he can tell, the sound of breathing way too close to the familiar pattern of Dongju’s breaths, and a scent that he almost recognizes, like a vampire, way too close to Dongju’s cherry wine blood.

“Dongju?” he calls out, not because he’s scared, or worried. No, he steps into the hall, finally, and catches sight of two figures by the front door, in long black coats, and Dongju half frozen on the stairs, hand against the railing.

“Seoho?” Oh, he knows that voice.

A big grin spreads on his face and he flies forward before he can stop himself, fists already balling to deliver a playful punch to a strong shoulder that he knows can take it, yelling, “Oh, Geonhakkie! I haven’t seen _you_ in so long!”

Geonhak rubs at the spot Seoho hit, though it can’t possibly have hurt, and squints at him. “Maybe for the better.” He gestures in the general direction of where Dongju must still be frozen to the stairs, raising both of his eyebrows. “Care to explain who _that_ is, and why he’s in your house?”

But before Seoho even gets the chance to utter a, _You need to stop always being so judgmental, Geonhakkie_ , the second figure steps forward, light catching on their face to reveal soft features and a smile.

“Yonghoon hyung!” A hand meets Seoho’s head before he can even take a step forward, messing up his hair. Yonghoon always looks nice and pleasant, always smiling, but Seoho knows all too well how treacherous that smile can be. “Oh dear, why are you both here? Am I in trouble?”

“Not yet, but we can certainly arrange that.” Geonhak steps past him, finally advancing into the hall, and a look over his shoulder tells Seoho that Dongju has descended the stairs, now standing frozen by bottom of it.

He’s blinking at the strangers, so different from the night Seoho first met him, suddenly so shy.

“Wait,” Geonhak says, turning around after he’s taken a better look at Dongju, and Yonghoon has followed him closer to the stairs. “I’ve seen this face before. Isn’t this who you were with that night we went out?”

“It is.” Seoho sidles up Dongju’s side, and he catches Dongju looking at him from the side of his eyes.

Geonhak opens his mouth again, likely not to be mean, because he isn’t like that in front of strangers, usually, but to poke at Seoho’s ego a little, but he’s cut off by Yonghoon. He steps forward, almost into Dongju’s space, his smile almost cooing. “Oh dear, isn’t he lovely? Tell me, sweetheart, what’s your name?”

“Uh.” Dongju blinks at him, lips moving around silent words for a second. “Dongju. Son Dongju.”

“Oh, lovely.” Yonghoon smiles that perfect, gentle smile of his, eyes so full of warmth even Seoho can feel it though his eyes stay locked on Dongju. “Sorry, I’m not trying to pry on the first meeting, but are you and Seoho …?”

Dongju clears his throat, and his eyes catch on Seoho’s. A question, lips hanging open just that bit. Because he knows what Yonghoon is asking, what anyone would ask, but he doesn’t know the answer. How many times has he stood in front of his brother and his judging eyes, and wasn’t able to give an answer? Seoho doesn’t know it, either.

“Don’t you guys want to come inside first?” Seoho asks loudly, and Yonghoon looks at him in surprise. Seoho only smiles, claps his hands. “Those must have been long travels, we should grab something to eat.”

Dongju is quiet as he follows him back into the kitchen, but he stays by his side.

“So, how long has this been going on?” Geonhak drops down on the couch, throwing his legs up on the table. “If you tell me that it’s actually been a thing since that night, I am literally going to hit you.”

Seoho pouts. Geonhak is always so mean to him. “Why?” he asks, just to be petulant.

“ _Because_ ,” Geonhak gestures in the direction in which Dongju disappeared up the stairs, “Because it’s been almost, like, two years since that night, which is a lot for a human. And when Yonghoon asked him if you two were a serious thing, the poor boy didn’t even know what to answer, and I’m currently giving you enough benefit of the doubt to not presume that it’s because you two have been fucking for nearly two years and you’ve been letting him live in your house and probably spoiled him rotten without you ever letting him know if any of it was ever serious to you.”

Seoho blinks at him, doesn’t really know what to say to that although he can feel his heart sink. The first thing he can think to say is, unfortunately, “Look, I didn’t do it on purpose.”

Geonhak throws his head back with a long groan, and Seoho almost feels like he deserves it. “I know, you never do anything on purpose, Seoho.” The words sting in a weird way. Seoho isn’t sure if they were meant to be insulting, if he should feel insulted, or if they lift the fault off of him. Knowing Geonhak, though, they probably don’t.

They sit in silence for a little while. Yonghoon kidnapped Dongju up the stairs, probably to dote on him, as he does, and Geonhak has since let Seoho know that the only reason they came together was because Yonghoon has been living in his estate on the other side of town with him ever since his own was burnt down by some rascals from the city. (“Youngjo loves him, but he’s driving us both slowly mad,” Geonhak whined. “ _Please_ take him.”)

Finally, though, Geonhak speaks up again, “I get it, you know. When Youngjo and I first started, I thought it was nothing serious, either. Or well, it was rather that I didn’t care much about putting a label on it. It seems stupid, unimportant, I know. Lucky for me, though, Youngjo was also a vampire, and he thought about it the same way. It’s just a mutual kind of understanding between immortals that those kinds of things don’t really matter in the long, long run of life, but humans are different in that aspect. Their lives are limited, so most of them will crave some kind of stability for the time that they are alive. They want to be sure, because they don’t have eons ahead of them to fix their mistakes. And if you care about him, and I’m sure you do, I hope you’ll want to provide that stability for him.”

Seoho stares at the wall in front of him. Surely Geonhak is right, but he would never say that out loud, not with the tight feeling in his chest clogging all words from spilling, anyway. Some people are just better at feelings than him.

He tells Geonhak as much, calls him a sap, and Geonhak throws a pillow at him.

“I can’t tell you how to live your life.” Geonhak shrugs. “I also don’t know him, maybe he doesn’t even want all of what I just said, maybe he’s content like this and Yonghoon just caught him off guard, he did seem rather shy. But if he does, and you want him to stay for even longer, maybe you should think about making things more serious.”

Things are serious, Seoho thinks, because he gets all disgustingly warm and mushy inside when Dongju rests against him and he stores blankets in every room of his house, now, just to make sure Dongju stays warm, and he keeps a fridge full of human food that he doesn’t really need so Dongju can eat and stay at his place for as long as possible because Seoho doesn’t really _want_ him to leave. He just throws the pillow back at Geonhak, though.

“He doesn’t even live here, by the way,” he informs him, and Geonhak rolls his eyes.

“Well, he sure moves around like he does.”

It’s later, when Geonhak and Yonghoon have both settled in the rooms Seoho assigned to them and he’s holed up in the warm upstairs bedroom with Dongju, that he allows himself to think harder about what Geonhak said.

Sure, he cares about Dongju all right. He already cared about whether or not they were in a relationship a few months into doing what they were doing and now it’s been much longer and he still hasn’t cleared that up. _Why not?_ he thinks, watching Dongju’s back where he’s bowed over his phone. Because he’s scared Dongju may not want to?

These aren’t thoughts that he ever likes to indulge in, but what human would stay with a never aging, timeless being for the rest of their limited life? When he could have another human who aged and loved just like him?

Immortals love in a different way from humans. Time isn’t limited for them, there’s none of the desperation that comes with knowing you could lose your loved one in a moment’s time. Seoho doesn’t see his immortal friends for years on end, and while he misses them occasionally, he never worries about losing them, they never fall out of touch. Humans love desperately, with all they have, they long to settle down with someone for life.

Seoho hasn’t known that feeling in many, many years, but he thinks he gets it now. Because he may be immortal, may be used to loving timelessly, but Dongju isn’t. He will be gone one day, and the thought hurts more than Seoho thought it would, and he can see the want to be sure, to have something certain before it’s gone forever.

“Dongju,” he calls out, just because he wants to say his name, but when Dongju looks up and the side of his face is still illuminated by the screen of his phone, he finds there are other words lodged in his throat.

“Yes?” Dongju asks after a moment of silence, raising both of his brows.

Seoho swallows. “About what Yonghoon hyung asked earlier,” he starts — but then this isn’t the way he wants to do this. Not when he can see Dongju’s fingers curling into the bed sheets below him, tense muscles, and he doesn’t _do_ things this way, _they_ don’t. He doesn’t talk softly in the quiet of his bedroom about things that are important.

Instead, he lunges forward, pins Dongju to the bedding, his phone clattering to the floor behind them. He holds him down with his weight even as Dongju blinks up at him in surprise, and he grins.

“You could have said yes, if you wanted to,” he says, and the words are so delicate, he has to say them like this. It’s his entire heart, bared for Dongju to see and take, claim and press to his mouth, so he has to smile when he says it. A defense mechanism, a shield in case Dongju sinks his teeth into it instead of kissing it.

But he does, so softly, eyes going round. It’s a bubble about to pop, softness they rarely indulge in, and Dongju frees his arm only to tuck a strand of hair behind Seoho’s ear and look at him, a tiny frown gracing his face.

“Hyung,” he says slowly, voice dropping so low it almost makes Seoho shudder.

“Mhm?” Seoho makes when Dongju doesn’t continue, just keeps on looking at him. His heart would be racing if it could, his face would flushing red. Instead, all he feels is Dongju’s rapid heartbeat against his chest. Just as nervous.

The smile that climbs onto Dongju’s face is so unusually warm it almost hurts to look at, reflecting in his eyes, and he seals his lips over Seoho’s to capture the warmth there, share it between their tongues. Only when they separate again does he speak. “Hyung,” he repeats, eyes full of a strange emotion. “I think I’m in love with you.”

And that’s so much, weird mushy feelings flooding Seoho’s chest that he isn’t used to. He doesn’t know how to deal with that, it almost scares him, and he sinks his head into Dongju’s neck and starts _laughing_ like a maniac.

Dongju tenses up underneath him, clearly terrified of the reaction, but Seoho clings onto him. Digs his hands into the fabric of his sweater and holds him place, scared that he will leave but not willing to voice it as laughter shakes him, like a curse. “I’m sorry,” he gasps. “I’m sorry, I swear, I love you, too. I just don’t know how to — I’m bad at this.”

It gets Dongju to laugh along, at least, and he relaxes under him, hands settling around Seoho’s back.

“I’m really sorry,” Seoho breathes out when the laughter finally leaves his throat. “I’ve never had to deal with this, it’s all so much at once, but I think I love you, too. I don’t ever want you to leave, at least.”

Dongju presses a small kiss to the top of his head, brushes his hair back. “That’s okay. We can figure it out.”

Seoho’s head drops against his chest, and he has to hold back another fit of laughter. It’s an instinct to laugh at things he doesn’t understand, things that may cause him a bit of pain, but he doesn’t need Dongju to know any more about his struggle with this, not for now. He’s right. They can figure things out, but Seoho doesn’t repeat it.

He just rests his head there and stays.

Geonhak leaves after a couple of days, has to return to his own estate and his waiting lover, but Yonghoon does not. The plan Geonhak showed up with goes to fruition without needing to convince Yonghoon, because he is quite literally and rather expectedly enamored with Dongju and doesn’t even want to leave.

It’s weird to adjust to another person living in his house, especially when Dongju has to leave for work and home, and Seoho has to live with Yonghoon on his own.

He stays to himself mostly, evidently tries not to bother Seoho, but it’s weird to think he hears everything he does.

Can’t even sit in his room and jack off in peace because Yonghoon would hear, and he doesn’t even want to think about that. Yonghoon has been a vampire for much longer than all of them, and he’s almost like a dad to them despite the minimal difference in physical age because he took them in and cared for them when they were first turned. The pure thought of doing anything sexual around him ever makes Seoho a little bit nauseous.

It’s only natural that they would look after him and offer him a place to stay after he’s lost his, and Seoho isn’t really complaining about having to live with him. He just wishes he could plug his supernatural hearing sometimes.

Because when Dongju comes over again the next weekend and Seoho is a bit desperate after having neither blood nor a proper orgasm in over a week, and Dongju is tense and exhausted from working all week, and they fuck way too loudly — Seoho sinks into the mattress afterwards, whining in embarrassment.

“Are you okay?” Dongju asks, resting a hand against his back. He’s pressing an ice pack to his neck and sipping juice out of a box, and he looks unfairly cute, really, but Seoho is way too embarrassed to even sit up and kiss him.

“I just heard Yonghoon snort, like, two stories below us. He definitely heard all of this.”

Dongju is silent, and when Seoho looks at him, he shrugs. “So what?” he asks. “You think he’s never heard a couple fuck with that hearing? For how long has he been alive?”

“Too long,” Seoho groans. “It’s not that he’s never heard it, but that it’s him. He practically raised me when I was a baby vampire. I wouldn’t be here today if it wasn’t for him, Ju, he’s like my _dad_.”

Dongju laughs, reaches out to mess up his hair. “Well, kids grow up. Stop whining, you big baby, I’m hungry.”

Seoho groans, pushing himself up nevertheless. “God, you’re so high maintenance. Who let you in here.”

He darts behind the door before Dongju can aim his shirt at him, and he goes purposefully slow when Dongju chases him down the hallway. Lets Dongju catch him, latching onto his back, feet hooking around his legs to trip him. He lets him kiss him when they reach the kitchen even though he knows Yonghoon is nearby, and they aren’t even wearing proper clothes, and he doesn’t whine all that much when Dongju holds onto his middle, leaned against his back, while he puts out some food for him. Only a little, for good measure.

His face doesn’t grow that red when he meets Yonghoon in the hall later. Dongju’s right. Kids grow up.

The months go by, turn into years. Dongju spends even more time at his house, until it seems he doesn’t ever leave. Dongmyeong moves out of his place, too, eventually, and Seoho helps them move his stuff, and they actually become friends. Kind of. At least Dongmyeong doesn’t squint at him anymore.

“It’s all a front, anyway,” Dongju lets him know. “He’s actually a big softie like, ninety percent of the time.”

And Dongmyoeng does seem grateful for Seoho’s help, appreciates the help of someone who can actually haul some boxes up the endless stairs to his new apartment, next to his brother who has never seen a day of exercise.

But then Dongju’s apartment is empty, almost sad. He spends most of his nights in Seoho’s bed because he doesn’t want to return to that empty place after work, too used to having someone with him. The apartment stays empty for weeks on end, only stepped into when Dongju needs to pick something up, and eventually —

“You can just live here, if you want.” Seoho looks at him, open, earnestly. “Then you won’t have to pay the rent.”

It’s decided with that, then, because why would Dongju say no to that. He basically has lived with Seoho for weeks, months even, before the offer came, and rent has only been an unnecessary pressure on him. To waste his money on a place he doesn’t even live in anymore, way too overpriced in the big city — his eyes light up at the prospect of living in his boyfriend’s big house on the hill, for free.

They move the last bits of his stuff over within a day, and Dongmyeong shows up again to help. In his peripheral, Seoho can see him knocking his hip into Dongju’s and throwing him a wink when they carry the boxes inside.

And with Dongju constantly around, now permanently when he isn’t at work, small car parked in front of the estate to take him in and out of town, the months pass even faster. Dongju leaves to visit his parents occasionally, always being picked up by Dongmyeong to drive them down to Gwangju, and he never takes Seoho, but that’s okay.

Seoho spends some quality time with Yonghoon instead, hanging upside down off the couch and playing video games that Seoho has to gently bully him into enjoying, and surviving off of Yonghoon’s blood bag stash.

And when Dongju comes back, he smells like summer in the south and street food and home.

On the morning of his twenty-ninth birthday, roughly five and a half years after they met, Seoho bakes him a small disaster of a cake and Dongju eats every last bite of it under laughter that brings tears to his eyes. Seoho watches with a smile as he unwraps the present his parents sent him, and Dongmyeong invites them both out for dinner, though Seoho still ends up having to pay with both of the brothers in food coma in the back of his car.

Yonghoon has bought him a present, too, a shiny new car parked in front of the house that has Dongju slapping both of his hands over his mouth and shaking his head vigorously. “Oh my god, hyung, this is too much —”

But his babbling is cut off by Yonghoon, reaching out to ruffle his hair. “The old one was about to die, and you need it to go to work. I really won’t miss the money, and I know you need it. And it’s your birthday!”

He does need a car, and the old _had_ been causing nothing but trouble, it’s true, so although a little hesitantly, looking at Seoho as if asking for confirmation that he’s allowed this, he sits behind the wheel and goes for a drive.

The rest of the night Dongju spends spinning around in his kitchen, turning up the music and wrapping both of his arms around Seoho’s neck. Birthdays don’t matter that much to him, either, but he glows that night.

“You’re older than me now, technically,” Seoho tells him, arms wrapped around Dongju as they dance.

A smile sneaks onto Dongju’s face, spreads out wide. “I don’t think that’s how that works,” he whispers, lips less than an inch from Seoho’s. “But you can call me hyung if you want.”

Seoho digs his fingers into the flesh of his sides until he squirms. “I think I’d rather die. Nice try, though.”

A bottle of wine later Seoho carries him up the stairs and sets him down on their bed, tucks the blanket around his shoulders. Nothing would ever make him behave like this if Dongju were sober, but he’s too drunk to tease him for it, so Seoho presses a kiss to his warm forehead and brushes a hand through his hair.

“Thank you, hyung,” Dongju whispers when Seoho moves away to change. “This was a nice birthday. I love you.”

It’s still not something they say very often, it usually goes unsaid. A squeeze of a hand under the table, the blankets Seoho leaves for him everywhere and the fact that he got most of the windows repaired to keep out the cold better now that Dongju stays here permanently, the food Seoho sets out for him for when he comes home from work even if he can’t be around himself, the way Dongju combs his fingers through his hair when they wake up in the morning. All of it says _I love you_ more than a sentence ever could. It’s deeper, it feels more important.

But occasionally, when Dongju is drunk and soft like this, it’s nice to hear it, too.

“I love you, too,” Seoho says, because he can, and because it makes a smile tug on his lips. Silly little words, and they make them both so giddy, Dongju grinning up at him.

Seoho falls asleep with his face tucked into the back of Dongju’s neck, breathes in his scent so deeply. Warm.

Dongju has been twenty-nine for all of four months when he falls down the stairs.

He came home that day complaining about a headache, likely from stress at work, and he asked Seoho to give him a back rub because his neck felt stiff after sitting over his computer all day. When his muscles refused to really loosen up even under Seoho’s ministrations — only giving in to doing it when Dongju started actually getting irritated at his refusal to help him — he huffed and said that he would just go to bed, then. He said he wasn’t hungry, either.

In retrospect, his skin may have already been running a little hotter than normal, then, but Dongju always felt warm to him, so Seoho didn’t see anything seriously wrong other than a pouty boyfriend until that moment.

He’s just turned back to the show he was watching before Dongju came home, trying to get his head back into the plot, when he hears the crash in the hall, too dull to be anything but a body, and shoots out of his seat.

“Dongju?” he calls out, rushing out of the living room to see what happened.

Dongju has fallen down the stairs before, they are tricky sometimes, with the edges no longer as sturdy as they used to be after decades of use, but never has Seoho immediately been this worried about him. The first time they even laughed about it. Maybe it’s because in all of the years that he’s known him, Dongju has also never been this whiny and obviously unwell as tonight. Maybe it’s some weird kind of intuition, supernatural foresight.

He finds him sitting up by the bottom of the stairs, clutching his head, shoulders shaking in what almost looks like silent sobs. Seoho is by his side in a second, grasping his shoulders and pulling at him to look at his face. No tears grace his cheeks, but he’s squinting his eyes, closes them fully when Seoho moves and light hits his face.

“Dongju, what’s wrong? Did you hit your head?

He shakes his head, gently almost, seemingly fighting to open an eye. “No, I didn’t, I barely got up the stairs. My head just really hurts. Really, really bad. It feels like my brain is on fire. It’s never been this bad before.”

Seoho reaches over to brush his bangs out of his face, but he draws his hand back immediately after coming into contact with the skin of his forehead, scathingly hot. He almost wants to check his palm for a burn that he knows won’t be there. Instead, though, he pushes himself back up to get a thermometer and some medicine from the kitchen, says, “Oh god, you have a very bad fever, let me —”

Before he gets the chance to even finish his sentence, though, let alone take a step down the hall, Dongju bends forward and pukes right between his own legs, onto Seoho’s expensive carpet — not like he can worry about that.

“Oh dear.” He tries to reach out for him again, but Dongju pushes his hands away, throwing up another wave.

The commotion brings Yonghoon to the top of the stairs, already wrapped in his night robe. “What’s going on?” he asks, hurrying down the last steps when he spots Dongju’s predicament, sitting with his head still tucked between his knees and now heaving around dry sobs as occasionally, another wave of vomit breaks out of him.

“He’s sick,” Seoho hurries to explain, as if Yonghoon can’t see that. “He has a fever, and, well, probably something else. Can you stay with him for a moment, or get him to bed while I get him some medicine, or maybe you can do that and I’ll get him up the stairs, I don’t know —”

“Seoho, dear, calm down,” Yonghoon says, eyes so kind. “I’ll get him to bed, or maybe into a bathroom until he stops vomiting, and you go grab some medicine for him and catch a breath, all right? You’re okay.”

Seoho nods, breathing out. He watches as Yonghoon helps Dongju stand up and helps him up the stairs, before he turns around and hurries into the kitchen. In the cabinet above the stove he used to store all of his medicine, back when he still had use for it, the potions full of cocaine that his mother used to feed him when he ran a fever as a child, or when he last had something like a human lover. The only thing in there right now are two near empty packs of ibuprofen, for Dongju’s headaches after work, and his seafood allergy shots.

Before he can stop himself, he throws on his coat and rushes into town within minutes, feet carrying him faster than even he is used to, to the first pharmacy he can think of. The lady behind the counter seems rather concerned at his almost frantic behaviour, but she promises the pills she sells him will soothe nausea within an hour.

By the time Seoho returns to the house and speeds up the stairs with both the ibuprofen and the pills from the pharmacy clutched in his hands, Yonghoon has moved Dongju into their bed, a bucket in his lap.

They take Dongju’s temperature, coming in at a concerning 39.9°C, and Seoho makes sure he swallows one of both pills with enough water. Yonghoon, next to him, is looking up symptoms on his phone while Seoho brushes Dongju’s sweaty bangs out of his face, trying not to flinch every time he touches his scathing skin.

“You’re so cute when you worry,” Dongju tells him, voice coming out kind of weakly, but he still smiles.

“Then I really don’t want to be cute,” Seoho says, even if he can’t help his own smile. His hand falls away from Dongju’s face to thread their fingers together instead. “How are you feeling?”

“Not very well.” His voice sounds like he’s talking around a knot in his throat and he clutches the bucket.

“It’s probably a flu,” Yonghoon chimes up from next to them. “You said that your eyes hurt, right? Like they’re sore?” When Dongju nods, he sets down his phone and gives them both an encouraging smile. “Then it’s probably that. It’s bad, but it’s nothing you can’t overcome with some rest and medicine.”

Dongju nods, and Seoho tucks the blanket tighter around him. He’ll be okay soon. Seoho is sure.

But despite their best wishes and the promises of the lady at the pharmacy, the pills don’t even stay in. Dongju vomits them back up almost whole fifteen minutes later, and a couple of hours later they’re back in the bathroom. Seoho is holding him up over the toilet boil, but most of what comes out of his mouth by now is just the water they’ve been making him drink to keep him hydrated. He’s also near sobbing with the pain in his head.

During a rare break from the vomiting, Yonghoon takes his temperature again, and it’s risen by another degree. His cheeks are flushed a deep cherry red by now, and he can barely stand the light being on in the room.

“I’m not sure this is just a flu,” Yonghoon whispers when Seoho has carried Dongju back into bed once more and he finally fell asleep, tucked deeply under the covers. “If he gets worse, we should definitely take him to see a doctor.”

Seoho looks back into the room, to where Dongju is resting on the bed, almost peaceful now that he’s asleep. His face is still deep red and he must still be running extremely hot, but at least he’s resting for now. He tells Yonghoon as much, that they shouldn’t wake him unless absolutely necessary, that he should get as much rest as he can.

Yonghoon looks unsure, but he doesn’t dispute him.

It’s nearing the morning, now, the horizon lightening up when Seoho’s gaze wanders out of the window. It’s been nearly half a day since Dongju fell, and now that he’s thinking about it, he already mentioned an unusually strong headache the night before, and in the morning before he left for work he took another ibuprofen, something he doesn’t usually like doing so early, and even packed some for work. When Seoho goes to inspect his work bag, still hung up over a chair in the living room, he finds the pill pack in it empty. For how long has Dongju been sick?

When the sun properly rises and the clock strikes an hour that is acceptable, Seoho picks up the phone and calls into Dongju’s workplace to let them know that he won’t be coming in for at least a few days. The assistant on the phone seems earnestly concerned about his wellbeing and keeps Seoho on the phone for longer than he likes.

When he finally gets to hang up, after assuring him, through his teeth, that surely Dongju would be fine in a couple of days, his next call is Dongmyeong, whose number he has to fish out of Dongju’s phone.

Dongmyeong very much sounds like he just got up, perhaps the ringing of his phone served as his alarm, and he’s still yawning as he asks Seoho where he got this number from, and what he’s doing calling so early. However, when Seoho tells him what happened, he suddenly seems wide awake in an instant.

“Oh my god,” he whispers into the phone. “Is he okay?”

“I don’t know, I —” Seoho swallows, trying to collect himself. “You’re the only one of his family members that I know, so I thought it would be best to call you as soon as possible, maybe you can come and —”

“Yes, yes,” Dongmyeong cuts him off. “I’ll be there right away, oh my god.”

And he is, car pulling into Seoho’s driveway less than an hour later, and Dongmyeong hurries into the house with long strides, following Seoho upstairs into the warm bedroom they’ve been keeping Dongju in.

Dongju is still asleep, though he was semi-conscious about half an hour ago so Seoho could make him drink some water and at least try to make him swallow another ibuprofen. So far, it hasn’t resurfaced, and Seoho decides to take that as a good sign, even if Dongju keeps on burning, sweating through his clothes.

Dongmyeong sits down on the bed next to him, reaching out a hand to brush over Dongju’s shoulder. Seoho can’t see his face from this angle, but he can almost sense the tears in his eyes.

“How long has he been like this?” Dongmyeong asks without turning around, but his voice swims.

“We’re not really sure,” Seoho admits. “He complained about a headache two days ago already, but even he didn’t think anything of it, he sometimes gets them after work. But they didn’t seem to fade overnight, he still had them yesterday morning, and then last night was when he started vomiting and when I first noticed he had a fever.”

“Have you called a doctor? Or at least looked up symptoms to see what could possibly be wrong?”

Seoho swallows at the accusing tone. Of course Dongmyeong is only worried, but Seoho is trying his best, too. “We looked up symptoms and Yonghoon said that it might be a flu at first, but now we’re not so sure.”

Dongmyeong stays silent for a moment, his hand reaching out to brush Dongju’s hair out of his face. “I think it’s good that he’s resting, that’s probably the best thing to do,” he says slowly. “If he can keep medicine and water down now that’s even better. But if he wakes up and his fever gets worse, I’m taking him to the hospital.”

Seoho nods. “That’s what we planned to do, too.” He looks out of the window again, where the sun is progressing across the sky way too fast. “Yonghoon is getting some more pain killers and fever medicine right now, I can call him and tell him to pick up something to eat for you, if you’re hungry.”

Dongmyeong hums and nods slowly. “I forget you freaks don’t need to eat. You have nothing at home?”

“Well.” Seoho allows himself a bit of a chuckle at that. “I do have food in the fridge, Dongju does live here, too, you know. But I’m not that great of a cook, and you look like you need more than some yoghurt.”

After a moment, Dongmyeong nods. “Well, if he’s out, anyway …,” he mumbles.

Seoho nods, too, even if Dongmyeong can’t see him, and steps backwards. “Right, I’ll call him.” _Give you two some time alone_ , he doesn’t say, but he can tell from the way Dongmyeong slumps forward that he got him.

He hurries down the stairs to get his phone, left behind in the kitchen, and he pretends he doesn’t hear the tiny sobs Dongmyeong lets out behind him, the gentle words he whispers, assuring Dongju that he’ll be okay. Seoho pretends he doesn’t feel his heart contract at the fact that Dongmyeong is this worried.

Humans get sick all the time, Dongju has been sick before in the time they’ve known each other, but something about this is different. Something about this has even his human brother cry at his bedside.

Dongmyeong eats and passes out on the couch, and neither Seoho nor Yonghoon comment on his red eyes.

They wake Dongju up as gently as they can, even if his eyes drag and he complains about the light being on. His temperature hasn’t risen more, but it also hasn’t sunken, and he throws the water they make him drink back up.

Like this, he also can’t keep any medicine down, and their only hope is small sips of water.

“I’m sorry,” Dongju whispers through a hoarse voice, forehead rested against Seoho’s cheek, sweaty and hot. Seoho itches to take his temperature again, just to make sure he isn’t getting worse within minutes, but they just did, and Dongju also seems to barely be able to keep his eyes open. He needs rest.

“None of this is your fault,” Seoho assures him, stroking down his back. “You’ll be okay, all right?”

Dongju blinks, looking up in confusion, as if he recognizes the words. “Was Dongmyeong here earlier?”

Seoho hums against his head, smiling. Dongju has always been able to hear things even in his sleep. “Yes, he still is, but he’s asleep downstairs. I kind of called him at what was basically the middle of the night for him.”

A frown creases Dongju’s forehead — tiny, so as to not worsen his aching head — “Why did you call him?”

“Well, he’s the only person in your family I know.” Seoho shrugs. “He’s very worried about you, I think he would’ve killed me if he found out you were this sick and I didn’t call him.”

Dongju doesn’t say anything for a while, and Seoho almost thinks he’s fallen back asleep, but when he moves to lay him back down, Dongju’s eyes are still open. He’s staring at the wall in front of them, blinking slowly.

“Dongju?” Seoho asks carefully.

“How sick am I, hyung?” His voice still sounds hoarse, but now there’s a deeper note to it, a serious question.

“We don’t really know,” Seoho admits slowly. His hand stays on Dongju’s back, skin burning even through the fabric of his sweater. “You have a pretty bad fever, still, and if it gets any worse we’ll take you to the hospital immediately. Even if it’s nothing serious, they will probably know how to help you better.”

Dongju nods. “Okay.” He slides out of Seoho’s arms and lies back down by himself. “Wake me up when you do.”

“Of course,” Seoho promises, getting up and turning the light off.

Within minutes, Dongju has drifted off into sleep, his breaths evening out and turning into snores just as Seoho opens the door. He smiles to himself, allowing himself that bit of joy, as he descends the stairs.

In the kitchen, he finds Dongmyeong up and awake again, eating the yoghurt Seoho mentioned earlier, and Yonghoon yet again bowed over his phone. Seoho doesn’t think he’s seen him use that thing as much in all of the years he’s known him as he has in the past twenty-four hours.

Dongmyeong looks up from his yoghurt when Seoho enters the room. “How is he doing?”

“Not visibly any better.” Seoho drops down on one of the chairs. Exhaustion is settling deep into his bones, too, even if he doesn’t really need to rest the way humans do. “He fell back asleep just now. His fever hasn’t gotten any worse so far, but it hasn’t gotten better, either. The bit of water he had is staying in so far.”

Dongmyeong nods, clasping his hands together in front of his face. “Even if he doesn’t get worse, as long as he also doesn’t get better I think we should still take him to the hospital by tonight at the very latest.”

Yonghoon nods, finally looking up from his phone. “I think we should actually take him to the hospital as soon as possible. I’ve been doing more research on his symptoms and it’s not impossible that he has some kind of infection, and that if he doesn’t get medical attention, this could possibly turn out to be life threatening.”

Seoho nearly flies out of his chair. It’s only been a few minutes since he left Dongju upstairs to sleep, he’s aware, but he would rather wake him up again now, than not have him wake up at all anymore.

Dongmyeong and Yonghoon wait down in the hall while Seoho hurries upstairs again.

Dongju has twisted himself into the bedsheets deeper, pillow stuffed firmly under his neck, one leg hanging out from under the blanket. He seems peaceful, almost, snoring lightly, and Seoho hates to approach him like this. But he does, reaches out to shake his shoulder, thumb along his cheek, tickle under his ear where he knows he hates it.

The only reaction he gets is Dongju turning his head to the side, humming. He’s still burning up under his hand, maybe even hotter than he was before, and Seoho tries to talk to him to wake him up. Dongju barely stirs.

He’s always been sensitive to sounds in his sleep, a door falling shut down the hall can rouse him in the morning, and he will be able to remember what people talked around him while he was asleep when he wakes up. Now, though, he lies still, eyes moving ever so slightly under his lids, and his lips part to let out a frazzled breath.

Seoho grabs him by the arm, tries to be gentle but in his head he hears Yonghoon say something about life threatening, and the fear that settles deep in his guts makes his hand clench, firm around his arm.

“Ju,” he whispers, shakes him harder. “Ju, Dongju, wake up. We gotta get you to the hospital. _Now_.”

No reaction, at least not more than before, and Seoho pulls him up by his shoulders, shakes him with one hand around his shoulder and the other reaching up to grab his face, tilting it up to get a look at his eyes. Still closed, but moving. He’s breathing harder, too, but he’s not waking up, not opening his eyes, not saying anything.

“Dongju,” he tries again, louder, firmer, patting his cheek. “Come on, Dongju, _please_ wake up.”

And — he does. His eyes fly open at once, and he gasps out a breath. But instead of saying anything, of doing anything, even _breathing_ , he stares off past Seoho’s head, and his arms begin to shake. Just slightly at first, almost as if he’s shivering, and Seoho automatically looks for the windows to see if they’re closed. They are, of course they are when they have a sick person resting in this room, and Dongju’s shaking gets worse, until he’s almost jerking.

His legs kick out and his arms jerk where Seoho is still almost desperately clutching them, and he’s still not fucking breathing, or looking anywhere except the wall. It takes Seoho a moment to realize that this is a seizure.

“Hyung!” he calls out, releasing Dongju from his grip. “Yonghoon hyung!”

Yonghoon is there in a second, up the entire flight of stairs within a moment, and he lets out an audible gasp at the sight of Dongju thrashing on the bed. “Oh _shit_ ,” he curses under his breath. “This is not good.”

“I think we can all see that, hyung. What do we do?”

It takes Dongmyeong about half a minute longer to get up the stairs than Yonghoon, and he’s out of breath when he bursts through the door, immediately stumbling back at the sight of his brother.

“It should stop soon,” Yonghoon says, evidently trying to remain calm. “If it doesn’t, we’re in big trouble.”

Thankfully for all of them, Dongju’s body stops convulsing only a few seconds later, coming to a rest, flat on the bed. He starts breathing again, too, taking in deep gulps of air. His eyes stay open, moving and finally finding Seoho’s face. Licking his lips, he asks, “We’re going to the hospital?”

“Immediately,” Seoho confirms, helping him sit up again. “You okay with being carried or do you want to walk?”

“I don’t think I _can_ walk.” Dongju wraps his arm around the back of Seoho’s neck and groans when he pulls both of them up. “My entire body kinda feels like jelly. Where are we going again?”

“The hospital.” Seoho looks at him in confusion, but his eyes catch on something else. The weird redness on Dongju’s cheeks, one that doesn’t exactly look like the fever flush he’s been sporting. It’s splotchy, like red dots littering his cheeks, almost like a rash — “Hey hyung, come take a look at this?”

“Oh shit,” Yonghoon says over his shoulder. He grabs Dongju’s water glass off the nightstand and presses it to the redness on his cheek. “Oh fucking hell, this is not good. Get him downstairs immediately.”

“What is that?” Seoho asks as he properly lifts Dongju up into his arms and stands up.

“A rash.” Yonghoon collects one of the blankets off the bed and folds it over his arm before he picks up the bucket from the floor, probably for the ride. “And it’s not disappearing when you press on it, which rashes normally do.”

“And that means?” Dongmyeong asks as they rush down the stairs and out of the house. They will have to take the car, because while Seoho and Yonghoon could definitely be there faster, they are not going to run the risk of anything happening to Dongju while they speed through the city. They’d rather have him safe and warm in the car.

“That means we have to get going,” Yonghoon says, sliding behind the wheel while Seoho takes the backseat with Dongju, and Dongmyeong climbs into the passenger seat, “because your brother has an inflammation in his brain and it’s going to kill him. Let’s go.”

Gently, Seoho sets Dongju back down on the bed, brushes his sweaty hair out of his face.

He’s still asleep. As he should be, because a look out of the window confirms to Seoho that it’s still the middle of the night, black starless sky spanning over the city. Dongmyeong was helped inside the house by Yonghoon after already passing out in the car, and he’s probably fast asleep on the couch downstairs.

“You think he’ll be okay?” Yonghoon is leaning in the doorway when Seoho turns around.

Dongju’s hand lies in Seoho’s, limp, but hot. Burning, even. The fever hasn’t gone down despite the medication he got at the hospital. “He has to be,” Seoho whispers, squeezing his fingers around Dongju’s.

“He will be,” Yonghoon says, even if Seoho knows that no one can be sure. Not even the hospital staff was able to make any concrete predictions. Said they’d just have to wait and hope, give him his antibiotics and pray. Bacterial meningitis, probably caught at work or while he was out getting lunch with a friend, and they went to the hospital way too late. They could have helped him had they gone earlier. “I firmly believe he will. He’s strong.”

“I know,” Seoho mumbled. “Never seen anyone bite through life the way he does.”

It’s silent for a moment, Yonghoon lingering by the door but not leaving. He has something to say, Seoho can almost taste it in the air, the heaviness of the words at the tip of his tongue.

“Spit it out,” Seoho mumbles, still running his hand through Dongju’s hair. He looks so pale.

Yonghoon clears his throat. “I mean, you could always … In case he doesn’t make it after all, you could —”

“No.” Seoho cuts him off sharply and turns around. His hand stays rested against Dongju’s burning cheek. “No, hyung, that’s completely out of the question. He will survive this, or if not … then not.”

Yonghoon frowns. “So you would rather see him dead than —”

“I would rather not see him like this at all,” Seoho says, and he continues when he sees Yonghoon open his mouth again, “I’m not discussing this with you. It’s not your decision, and I’ve already talked about this with him. Not in relation to him literally being on the verge of dying, but in general, and I explained why I don’t want to.”

“I don’t know, to me it just almost seems like you’re ashamed of what you are.”

Seoho snorts. “I’m not. But you saw me when I was first turned. I wouldn’t want to put someone I love through it.”

Yonghoon finally turns around at that. “Okay,” he says way too kindly, way too gently. “It’s your decision.”

It was one of the very few serious fights they ever had. Playful banter marked their everyday life, trapping each other in headlocks and chasing one another around the house until one of them broke and gave in.

But one day, roughly three years after they first met, Dongju asked if Seoho would turn him into a vampire.

“Not like, right now,” he laughed when Seoho froze up where he had him pinned to the bed. “I still have a life to deal with and I should maybe warn Dongmyeong in advance, but like. One day. Before I grow old and wrinkly.”

Seoho stayed quiet, stared up at him. His face, small and curved so perfectly it could fit in one of Seoho’s palms, the tops of his cheeks flushed red from chasing him down the hallway, breath still coming in pants. The wild innocence in his eyes, bright and deep and never having witnessed a death.

There is something so magical about mortality, something that immortals lose. Dongju is full of life, he pulses with it, he’s always looking for more, always taking more. No matter what life throws at him, he always stays standing, he leans on the people around him, he looks left and right before he crosses the street because even if he were to want to die, his body would automatically try to keep him alive. It would force him downstairs into the kitchen if he tried to starve himself, it would force breaths into his lungs if he tried to suffocate. His arms and legs would thrash and fight anyone who’d try to hold a pillow over his face. It would make him look out for cars before crossing the street.

There is such brutality in the human body’s instinct to keep itself alive, and it’s what makes it so painful. The body fights the transformation into a vampire, fights the venom in its veins, and in the end, it always loses. Losing your body’s survival instinct is one of the most painful aspects of the transformation, and it drives people into suicide.

Vampires can die, even if it’s difficult. And Seoho has seen too many impaled bodies, grieving after losing the one thing that made them human. The deep, primal instinct, the _want_ to stay alive. What else is there to fight for, then?

Not in a million years would he be able to do that to Dongju, take away his mortality.

“I wouldn’t,” he told him, and Dongju’s flinched to look at him. He didn’t expect that kind of answer, of course not.

“What?” he asked, almost breathless. Unbelieving. “What do you mean, you wouldn’t? But I will die if you don’t. In your understanding of time, I will die pretty soon. And before that I will get old and wrinkly and frail.”

Seoho reached out to touch his hair, his skin, so warm, but Dongju pushed his hand away. “I would rather bury you than make you go through turning into a vampire. It’s horrible, Ju. The worst thing that ever happened to me, I would rather be dead now if I had the chance to go back in time and change it. I’ve had years to adapt to it, which is why I can deal with it now, but the first few years I wanted nothing but to die.”

Dongju blinked at him, but he didn’t say anything.

“That’s why I needed someone like Yonghoon hyung to look after me, because otherwise I would have killed myself. I would never forgive myself if I willingly put someone I love through it, and you’d never forgive me, either.”

“So this is about you?” Dongju asked, laughing a little. He didn’t sound happy. “You would rather see me die, or maybe drop me altogether once I’m too old and my blood is all cloggy and gross and I run the daily risk of a heart attack, than have a guilty conscience for a little while or have me possibly be mad at you?”

“That’s not at all what I said.” Seoho frowned. “I said that it’s a beyond horrible thing, both the transformation and what comes afterwards, the existence as a vampire, and I would not want to do that to you.”

“I’m pretty sure that death is also a horrible experience, so I gotta pick my poison, huh?” Dongju raised a brow.

“Well, you’re not really picking,” Seoho said, and there was not much humor in his voice. “Unless you find another vampire to turn you, because I’m not doing it. Ever.”

Dongju pushed off him and crawled off the bed. “Fuck you,” and he said it so neutrally. It felt like a punch to Seoho’s gut. “Maybe Yonghoon will do it for me. Or Geonhak. Or a random vampire in some dirty alley will kill me.”

Seoho stayed very still on their bed, closed his eyes. He willed himself not to run after him immediately, stop him from going. Yonghoon wouldn’t do such a thing without asking him first, and Dongju didn’t even know where to find Geonhak, and he was too smart to seriously subject himself to the fangs of some back alley vampire.

He would come back, and they would have a proper conversation about this. Seoho stayed where he was.

The sun is almost back up in the sky when Dongju slowly blinks his eyes open.

“Good morning,” Seoho says slowly, trying not to startle him. But Dongju only looks up at him, blinking like he didn’t even say anything. His eyes seem near empty, unrecognizing. “How are you feeling?”

Dongju’s lips fall open, a tiny frown creasing his forehead. Not a word passes the cracked expanse of his lips, but he makes a small sound in the back of his throat, as if strangled. Seoho reaches to pour him another glass of water.

Dongju drains it in a second, and Seoho pours him another one, advising him to go slow before he choked, and Seoho sits and watches him as he takes slow sips. He reaches out again to brush a hand down his cheek, only to notice he’s gotten even hotter, now really almost burning the cold skin of Seoho’s hand.

He takes his temperature again, and it’s risen to a new high despite the medication. Seoho’s hand shakes as he sets the thermometer back down on the nightstand. Before he can pull his hand away, Dongju’s fingers find his.

Even his hand is burning, but Seoho takes it like he was never meant to hold anything else, threads their fingers together. Dongju holds onto him, and he smiles even if his eyes seem tired, almost crusted with sleep.

“Hospital?” is the only word he gets past his lips, and it sounds almost desperate.

“We took you there last night,” — Dongju blinks in surprise at this, even though he was awake for at least brief periods of time while they were there — “And they gave us some medication that you have to keep on taking, and we just have to hope that it will lower you fever and fight off the infection as soon as possible. You’ll be okay soon.”

Dongju nods, doesn’t say anything else. His eyes raise to stare up at the ceiling, leaving Seoho’s face.

“Are you hungry? You haven’t eaten in a while, and you’re not throwing up anymore right now.”

Dongju shakes his head, and his fingers draw patterns on the blanket. At least he seems to be able to move, mostly. His eyes find Seoho’s again, don’t have to search long because Seoho is always already looking at him, and his lips find a smile. A soft one, almost gentle, and Seoho hopes he doesn’t mistake exhaustion for affection.

“Dongmyeong?” Dongju asks after another moment, eyes sweeping the room.

“He’s downstairs,” Seoho informs him. “Probably sleeping. He was up all night at the hospital. But I can go wake him up, I’m sure he wants to talk to you, too. He’s worried sick.”

Dongju doesn’t reply — can’t, maybe — but he smiles again, so Seoho gets up.

Dongmyeong is indeed passed out on the couch downstairs, hand dangling over the edge and a still halfway filled cup of cold tea on the table by his side. Yonghoon must have set it out. He wakes almost immediately when Seoho shakes his shoulder, sitting up and asking with an edge of what almost sounds like fear to his voice, “Is he okay?”

“For now,” Seoho confirms. It pains him to say. “He’s awake and he asked for you.”

Dongmyeong pushes off the couch without another second of hesitation, doesn’t spare Seoho another glance as he hurries out of the living room and sprints up the stairs. Seoho shuts off his ears, and goes to look for Yonghoon.

He finds him in the kitchen, of course, sitting at the counter in the night robe he never took off, clutching a cup of coffee between his hands. He doesn’t look up when Seoho enters the room, although he obviously notices him, just keeps on staring at the wall opposite of him. A sip of coffee, nowhere close to the satisfaction blood brings, but good.

Coffee sounds like a fantastic idea, but it always makes Seoho just a bit jittery, and he needs to be at the absolute best of his abilities in case anything happens to Dongju. Good or bad.

“It’s been a while since I last had a human die in my presence,” Yonghoon says.

“That sounds like a good thing,” Seoho agrees. Yonghoon has never been the type of vampire that would kill humans, not even on accident. Not in all of the years they’ve known each other. “But Dongju is not dying.”

“It’s been a while since I last had a human die in my presence,” Yonghoon repeats, making Seoho look at him and frown. “But I think I would still be able to tell the signs.” His hands visibly tighten around the cup in his hands, muscles flexing. “Humans are very good at sensing it, too, but they don’t notice that they do. Why do you think is Dongmyeong so upset? No kind of sibling would ever worry about their sick brother this much if there wasn’t more to it.”

It’s silent for a moment before Seoho asks, “So you’re saying that you think he’s dying?”

“I’m saying that I think there are signs that point to a human’s death before it occurs, both in their behavior and the behavior of the humans surrounding them, and to ignore them is foolish.”

Seoho rests his head in his hands and decides not to say anything else. Yonghoon always knows when he’s right, and he refuses to talk about anything else. Now is not really the time Seoho wants to sit around analyzing the behavior of everyone around him to look for signs of Dongju dying. Yonghoon can do that for him, if he wants to.

Now, all Seoho wants to focus on is Dongju’s survival.

By the time Dongmyeong descends the stairs again, Seoho has gotten at least two hours of well deserved shut eye, and Dongmyeong assures him that Dongju is fast asleep, too, before he resumes his position on the couch. Seoho offers him another cup of tea and maybe some breakfast, but Dongmyeong kindly declines.

He’s tired — they all are, but he needs to rest more than Seoho and Yonghoon do.

Instead, Seoho makes breakfast and loads it on a tray to carry it upstairs. Dongju is still asleep, as he should be, but Seoho can set the tray down on the nightstand and wait for him to wake up again.

If he does, that is.

Seoho shakes his head to get rid of the thoughts. Of course Dongju will wake up. He will wake up and he will take his antibiotics and his fever will sink and he will be okay. The people at the hospital didn’t seem to know what to do, really, because it was so late into the process of the infection, but Seoho knows Dongju will be okay.

He’s seen him handle a short staffed shift and yelling customers and malfunctioning appliances all at the same time, so it would be almost rude to assume he couldn’t handle this. If he can handle a broke and depressed Dongmyeong sleeping on his couch and moving and fighting with Seoho over everything all the time and Yonghoon smothering him half to death with his love, he can handle a bit of a fever. Right?

Except that he doesn’t wake up, not after two hours, not after three. Seoho falls asleep with his head bedded on the mattress, right next to Dongju’s arm, radiating heat, still sitting on the chair next to it.

It’s been almost two days since Dongju first fell down the stairs, even longer since he first experienced symptoms. Seoho can’t even begin to imagine the suffering he must be going through, the confusion and the dizziness and the pain in his head, where his literal brain is inflamed and is slowly building up more pressure.

Seoho wishes he could relieve him of all of it, but there are only two ways to do that.

_Would you turn me into a vampire, if I asked you for it?_ Dongju asked that night, sitting on the line of Seoho’s hips in the way he always does, warm in his arms but pinning him down. He smiled, teeth gleaming in the golden light of the bedroom, because he expected Seoho to say yes. Of course he did. In his head, it’s the perfect solution, to stop his aging and his imminent death, to keep him young and beautiful and at Seoho’s side forever.

There is so much he doesn’t know. So much he can’t ever know, not because he’s dumb or too young or too innocent, but because there are things he hasn’t seen, hasn’t felt, hasn’t even heard enough about.

He hasn’t seen the rows of burning vampires who lost their will to live, he hasn’t heard the cries of older vampires losing their lovers who begged to be turned to the temptation of eternal peace. Death is always a step ahead of humans, something they are always aware of but not something they usually spend too much time thinking about.

When you are already dead, things change. Death is no longer a threat, a looming existence over your head. It’s a companion, almost, a wish. What is there to live for, if nothing ever ends?

But this is ending, now. Seoho knows, even if he tried to deny it in the kitchen with Yonghoon. This, Dongju’s life and their love in all its beauty and horror, is ending far too soon. Dongju lies so very still on the bed, breaths coming almost labored, and every single one he draws in feels like a puncture to Seoho’s own lungs.

He could help him. He could end it right here, hold a pillow over his face and tell the others that it’s over, that the fever killed him, or that his brain gave in to the pressure. He could relieve him of his pain and spend the rest of his eternity longing, heart hurting for something that he knows he can never have back, can never repent for.

Or he could slide his hand under Dongju’s chin and gently tilt his head back like he’s done a million times. He could close the distance and breathe in his familiar scent, the mix of sweat and the sweetness of his blood, nose along the smooth heat of his throat. Close his hand around his throat or keep his fingers so softly under his jaw, holding him back as he sinks his teeth into his neck and tries not to lose his mind as the blood flushes his mouth.

And he would drink from him, and he would slash a long wound into his own wrist with his teeth and watch as the velvety red drops between his lips, as it gets more and more and he’s forced to swallow it, let it slide down his throat.

There would be no noise. Nothing of the screaming and the crying that Seoho remembers from the back of the truck, where he lay still between those twisting bodies and swallowed down his own tears. Dongju is already asleep, it would be easy for him. It would still hurt, but he would be unconscious for most of it, at least.

It would be quiet, and Seoho would fall asleep next to him, exhausted. And Dongju would wake up, eventually, with changed eyes and a different face and a hunger that made him into a monster beyond anything human.

The cost of trading one’s mortality is high, and not everyone pays it voluntarily.

But before Seoho can make any kind of decision, Dongju wakes up one last time. If one could call it waking, because Seoho isn’t sure if he even notices anything of what is going on around him.

He just lies there, still, unmoving. His eyes are half open, and he’s looking at Seoho. Always is.

“I made you some breakfast,” Seoho says, and it comes out a little broken. The rice must be cold by now, and his cooking has never been that good to begin with. Dongju doesn’t even react. “If you’re hungry.”

Seoho is unsure if he heard him, if he can hear anything. Maybe his brain is too far gone. Maybe he’s already out of this world, maybe it's one last reaction to let Seoho know that there is life left in this body, that he could have saved him. Maybe this is Dongju’s ghost already setting out to haunt him. Or maybe he just doesn’t have any energy left.

“I love you, you know,” Seoho tries again, and this time it sounds almost like a sob.

Like a miracle, Dongju’s lips pull up into a smile. Just a little bit, barely there, but Seoho can see it, and it means he heard him. That he knows he’s loved. When Seoho drops his hand down on Dongju’s arm, slides it down to his wrist, to his palm, Dongju’s fingers move just the slightest bit, with all of his energy, to tangle with Seoho’s.

He can’t say it back, but that’s okay. Seoho knows.

The only thing he gets past his lips, through his dry throat, is, “Hyung, my head hurts.”

And Seoho almost has to laugh, though it comes with a weird wetness in his eyes. “I know, baby.”

And he also knows what’s going to happen when Dongju’s eyes fall shut again less than a minute later. He lets himself fall forward, rests his forehead against Dongju’s and squeezes his eyes shut.

It tears him apart, and he knows he can’t let go. No matter how much he tried to convince himself that he could, that there was nothing that would hurt him about having a mortal lover, that one day he would have to let go, anyway. And maybe one day he would have been able to, years in the future, when Dongju would have been old and ready to leave this world. But this is too soon, far too soon, only a couple of years after he’s met him. He can’t let go of him.

No tears fall, because they would soothe the pain inside of him. Instead, there is nothing but the raw tearing at his insides as he watches Dongju’s still face, the fine veins on his closed lids.

Seoho rests with his head on top of Dongju’s and listens closely as his heartbeat slows. His heart must be tired from keeping him alive, and once it stops, he will only have a couple minutes until everything else stops working, too.

“I love you so much,” Seoho whispers, even if Dongju can’t hear him. He noses down along the curve of his cheek, still so very hot, until he meets his jaw, mouth hovering over his neck. The blood is pumping through him so slowly, but it’s still pumping. It makes Seoho’s mouth water despite it all. “I’m so sorry.”

The world realigns itself once again when his teeth sink into Dongju’s skin.

The wail he lets out when Dongju is still on the mattress, letting his head fall forward against his chest, must have been loud enough to wake even Geonhak in his house on the other side of town.

Yonghoon and Dongmyeong are waiting for him downstairs when he descends the stairs.

Dongmyeong steps forward — his eyes are already red and his lips are quivering. Of course they would have interpreted Seoho’s scream the right way, of course they would know what it means.

But he hears Yonghoon let out a gasp at the sight of him.

And the first thing Seoho says to them is, turning to Dongmyeong, “I think you should leave.”

Dongmyeong’s mouth falls open, as if he wants to protest, brows furrowing. But he closes it again, and in the end, the only thing he says is, “Why?”

Seoho wipes a last drop of blood off of his lips. “He’s gonna wake up.” Shock bleeds out of Dongmyeong’s eyes in waves, his lips fall open to ask too many questions and Seoho doesn’t know the answer to any of them. His brain is swimming in his head, and he only knows one thing, “And he’s gonna be hungry.”

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed despite its heavy ending, if you did, consider leaving me a kudos & comment :)
> 
> [Twitter](https://twitter.com/kitthae) | [18+ Twitter](https://twitter.com/dxngjv)


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